Shelter Review
A few brief flashes of action cannot save this talkie Statham starrer.
Mason (Jason Statham) is just an aged, mysterious, silent man on a lonely island; at least, that is what he is in the eyes of Jessi (Bodhi Rae Breathnach), who brings him food weekly with her father. But when a freak storm strands her with Mason, she discovers not all is as it seems. With a world of spies descending upon him, led by Manafort (Bill Nighy), Mason must leave his seclusion to find a way to protect his young ward.
Shelter is an interesting beast. On the one hand, the trailer promises an action-heavy, classic Statham shoot-em/punch-em up. But when watching the film, you’d be forgiven for thinking this was partly Statham’s foray into a more dramatic element.
There are long stretches of silence. A windswept coast. A pseudo father-daughter relationship that is fleshed out over long car drives. Indeed, Statham barely carries a gun for most of this film, much less uses it.
Unfortunately, Shelter is the worse for it’s ambition to bring depth and nuance to the character.
The film plays with an relatively uncomplex overarching conspiracy, couched in tired and rote cliches. The CGI when implemented is jarring. The ultimate journey - a cross UK dash to get a girl to safety - feels small and insignificant. And the girl herself, is written and performed with a particularly leaden hand (the line delivery and writing of “He has cancer” elicited more than a few laughs in our screening).
There’s something about a good Statham actioner that brings you joy. You turn our brain off for a tight 90 minutes, and sit in the dark, and watch him get out of myriad impossible situations. It’s fun.
In Shelter, all of that fun is gone. The action isn’t there. The cast surrounding Statham aren’t up to scratch. The writing is leaden. There just isn’t enough energy or frission in this piece to make it stack up.
Which is a shame, because there are elements here that really work. A deep-state conspiracy in the age of AI, with a faceless Statham going up against Bill Nighy’s overlord like figure? Would have been great! A Rambo-esque island set survival movie where Statham has to protect a young charge in increasingly violent ways? Wonderful! Hell, even a long on the water or road talkie with Statham bonding with a young girl who fills a paternal instinct in him would probably be a good watch. But when they are all jammed together, as they have been here in Shelter, you wind up with none of them playing, none of them feeling fully fleshed out, and a giant, sorry sense of what could have been.
