For fans of the Chuck Norris films producers Menahem Golan and Yorum Globus made in the ‘80s through Cannon Films, “The Beekeeper” feels like an homage- it’s an over-the-top action fest that, despite being illogical and insipid, is a sweet escape into silly savagery.
Jason Statham stars as Adam Clay, a seemingly mild-mannered man who rents space on Eloise Parker’s (Phylicia Rashad) property to set up an apiary (bee hive colony) and sleep in an adjacent building to Eloise’s home. After saving his honeybees from a hornet’s nest that Adam quickly dispatches with a neat electrocution trick involving a fluorescent light bulb and a taser, we see Adam murders like MacGyver, but why? When Eloise falls victim to human hornets in the form of telemarketers that scam Eloise out of her savings, Adam springs into action to avenge the larceny that befell his landlady. Making a quick call to his former employers to track down the telemarketers who took Eloise’s money, Adam self-activates himself in his former role as a black ops assassin codenamed ‘Beekeeper’ (why Adam needs to be a literal beekeeper is never explained as the code name is not exclusive- it’s like having a French assassin codenamed ‘Le Cochon’ who’s an expert truffle hunter).
Because the movie is painted in broad strikes and bullet points plotwise, the call center Adam seeks is quickly found. Easily making mincemeat out of the two blazer-clad security bozos at the front entrance, Adam walks into the building and (after making inane references to beekeeping and ‘smoking out hives’), sets the call center ablaze. A surviving enemy underling alerts his boss: a spoiled silk-shirt wearing, scotch-swilling, politically-connected c-sucker named Derek Danforth (Josh Hutcherson, the kid from “The Hunger Games” who sports a mustache and resembles a young Pedro Pescal). Not only is Derek protected by former CIA director Wallace Westwyld (Jeremy Irons) who runs Derek’s family business, Wallace knows exactly what Adam and ‘Beekeepers’ do: as a John Wick/Jason Bourne combo clone, Adam’s a governmentally-trained renegade killing machine. While Wallace wishes Derek well in his next life, he nonetheless helps Derek because (wouldn’t you know it) Derek’s mother is indeed the ‘queen bee.’
There’s a comic book feel to ‘Beekeeper’s’ story that suits director David Ayer’s style- he directed 2016’s “Suicide Squad.” Ayer’s also good with action, directing 2012’s “End of Watch” with Jake Gyllenhaal and 2014’s “Fury” with Brad Pitt. Though the scenes in ‘Beekeeper’ defy logic, they’re just set-ups for outrageous action and creative kills. Forget the film’s set in Boston, yet when carnage takes place police response is non-existent. Forget Adam is hunted by the new ‘Beekeeper’ who thumbs her nose at being inconspicuous by parading around in a pink day-glo overcoat and drives a flatbed truck hauling a Gatling gun. Forget elite security not checking underground sewer access to a compound hosting an overcrowded party that should have been cancelled considering the CIA, FBI, rogue assassins and prominent political guests are all in attendance. And forget Adam has all the equipment and disguises he could ever need exactly when he needs it.
While I’m sure “Beekeeper” wasn’t intended to invoke memories of the mindless action movies Golan and Globus spearheaded in the mid-‘80’s, there’s a real sense that Statham’s slipped into the shoes Chuck Norris abandoned 40 years ago (in movies like “The Delta Force” and “Missing in Action”) and resurrected the role of good guy/modern gladiator. It’s tough not to enjoy revisiting brainless black-and-white action when it results in bad guys turning the desired hue of black-and-blue.