EXTRACTION directed by Sam Hargrave (USA, 2020)

extraction_282020_film29Whereas most action movies have plot holes, this one has giant craters. The filmmakers work on the quite reasonable assumption that most viewers are not expecting social-realism or profound insights into the human condition.

Normally, I’d pass on a film as mind-numbing as this but during this lockdown period the options available on Netflix are getting slimmer and slimmer. A good part of the streaming service’s content is tailored for ‘Young Adults’  I am increasingly struck by how few seem to have ‘Old Adults’ like me as their target audience.  ‘Extraction’ is aimed at  ‘ok, if there’s nothing better to watch’ market.

The story, such as it is, involves a mission impossible task allocated to ex-soldier Tyler Rake played by Chris ‘Hemsworth. Tyler is deployed to India to rescue the son of an imprisoned drug lord who has been abducted by a rival drug lord. You don’t need to know why one of these drug lords is deemed better than the other. All you have to focus on is that Ovi Mahajan Jr is in the hands of some very nasty men indeed and to take it on trust that Tyler is the only man who can possibly save him.

This against all odds mission, which he chooses to accept, is given to him by the strikingly beautiful Nik Khan (Golshifteh Farahani) who, when involved in action herself,  never wears protective head-gear so that we can admire her impressively shiny black hair.

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Chris Hemsworth as hunk and as Fat Thor

The last time I saw Hemsworth, he was Fat Thor in the Avengers-Endgame. Clearly, he’s been hitting the gym hard since then so that he is able to convincingly play an all but indestructable one-man killing machine.

90% of the film, involves him shooting, stabbing or pummelling dumbass soldiers to death. These come at him in conveniently manageable numbers so I was reminded of a Whac-A-Mole arcade game or a ‘kill or be killed’ video game. You rarely see the faces of these hapless victims just in case you might be tempted to think of them as human beings.

Tyler has an endless supply of grenades and a state of the art cell-phone that never needs recharging. The phone can pick up a signal even when he is forced to escape into an underground sewer (mine loses a GPS signal when I drive under a bridge!).

The only lull in the action comes after he’s been run down by a car and evades the enemy troops in a home of a fellow mercenary who just happens to be passing.  It is there that we learn that Tyler is divorced and that he lost a 6-year-old son to cancer. Would he be the man he is now if he hadn’t experienced this personal tragedy?  Who cares? Can we just get back to the killing!

I won’t spoil the ending but, suffice to say, I doubt they’ll be a sequel. For that, we should be thankful for small mercies.