ASSASSIN

US, 2023, 88 minutes, Colour.

Andy Allo, Nomzamo Mbatha, Bruce Willis, Dominic Purcell, Mustafa Shakir, Fernanda Andrade.

Directed by Jesse Atlas.

Sadly, this was Bruce Willis’s last film before he had to retire, loss of memory, aphasia. He will be remembered best from his earlier films and his Die Hard franchise and his venturing into a range of experimental films with top directors in the 1990s. In his later years, he made several of this kind of film every year, B-budget, B-plots, many of them forgettable.

The plot here is extremely convoluted and requires audience attention.

The focus is on a special Ops warrior who discovers her husband in coma. She is angry. However, she is informed that she is part of a special operation, very much in the science-fiction realm, a military operation with a special chip which can alter the personality when it is inserted, but also enables a person to assume other personalities, enter into other scenarios, with the incantation “this is not my body”.

In a remote centre, Bruce Willis is in charge of the operation. The special Ops warrior then is immersed in a cold bath, a machine set on her, and she is able then to assume the personality, conscious of her own as well, sent to confront a rival played by Dominic Purcell.

The action is mainly at the remote centre, the cold bath and ice, and the subject continually returning there after her encounters with the target.

Ultimately, there will be violence, her husband reappearing, giving an explanation for his disappearance, her being upset, some shooting.

The film runs for only 88 minutes.