Jason Statham’s ‘Wild Card’ Works Better as a Drama Movie

With a 25-year career on his shoulders, director Simon West seems to have a knack for helming remakes. He first set out to bring 1979’s When A Stranger Calls to a present-day audience in 2006. Seeing the decent success that it had at the box office, he then aimed to adapt an even more prestigious title from the ’70s, Charles Bronson’s The Mechanic. Actor (and all-around tough guy) Jason Statham was announced to be in the lead role soon after the project was initially developed. The film was praised by critics and welcomed by audiences as well when it was released in January 2011.

Seeing how West was on a roll with reboots, he saw it fitting to continue digging deeper into this filmmaking niche. Could he pull off three successful remakes, though? When it came to his modern take on a 1986 neo-noir thriller, Heat (based on a novel of the same name released just a year prior), Lady Luck did not seem to be on his side. As if he saw what the future held for this movie (not a positive one), West made a startling declaration in an attempt to change the incoming tide. His Jason Statham-starring remake Wild Card is better seen as a drama than an action movie.

‘Wild Card’ Features an Unusual Role for Jason Statham

Wild Card

Release Date

January 14, 2015

Runtime

92 Minutes

Stream

Stepping in for Burt Reynolds, Statham stars as Nick Wild, a bodyguard/chaperone for the various denizens located in and around Las Vegas. He accepts odd jobs as well, like showing tourists around the entertainment capital of the world, helping prop up men in front of their girlfriends, and beating up on those who he feels deserve it. According to West (in a detailed interview with Live for Films), the Fast and Furious star was crafting this film himself for at least five years before it finally arrived in the director’s sights. Wild Card quickly shows the trademark fighting skills that Statham is best known for.

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He brutally destroys a couple of gangsters that had assaulted and raped a young escort. Not once, not twice, but three times in the course of the film. They just don’t learn their lesson until the very end. But in the midst of all that, Statham surprisingly also portrays someone who has a gambling addiction, exhibits an anxiety attack, and constantly thinks about a different life. West just might be right. There are definitely traces of something more in Wild Card than just action.

Each of the Three Fights Progressed Statham’s Character in ‘Wild Card’

First, let’s look at the main actor’s dialogue. Nick Wild seemingly talks more than Statham’s characters in The Mechanic (mentioned above), Wrath of Man, and the entire Crank series combined. West was concerned with the number of lines, but the well-known English actor showed up on set with all of them memorized and ready to go. While this lone piece of trivia is not necessarily enough to persuade viewers to change the genre of the movie, fans of Statham will certainly see the actor in a different light once they watch. An argument could be made that he shows more emotions here than anywhere else in his career.

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If Statham stepping out of his usual silent hero type interests you, then you might just consider Wild Card to be a drama. The next biggest point to make favoring West’s “genre-transition” of Wild Card is the supposed character-driven performance. There are only three fights in this hour-and-a-half film. While being interviewed by Ryan Lambie of Den of Geek, West attempted to interconnect these to Wild’s personal arc. According to him, the first brawl is Wild needing to get back into the art of precision fighting, and the second time is more a manifestation of his own inner anger. West never explicitly says anything about the final melee we see in the climax — but that’s OK.

‘Wild Card’ Turns From an Action Movie to a Drama Flick?

Even though the attempt to put a thematic spin on Wild’s fight with Demarco’s goons (the first fight) is quite the far fetch to make (considering his hand-to-hand combat abilities are never explained), there is a great deal of truth when it comes to the latter. The tussle inside the casino happens around the same time as Wild’s display of excess gambling and subsequent panic attack. The anger that viewers see in his attacks against the gangsters doesn’t only come from a place of self-defense but disgust over his own personal choices.

In this case, the chain of events leading up to this showdown does a lot to add to the character’s violent outburst. Even though his fighting style is the usual brutal-and-quick routine, Statham lets himself be just a tad more reckless here, which proves he has ample acting range usually unseen.

Is that explanation enough to push Wild Card into being more of a drama movie, though? The first fight is admittedly nothing more than standard Statham flair, but the slow-building tension around the second one (and the scene itself) does lean toward the character’s overall arc. Could director Simon West be using the drama genre loosely here? There is a chance, but on the other hand, this 2015 film is definitely a bit different than what fans of Statham would usually expect. If you want to judge for yourself, Wild Card is available to stream for free on The Roku Channel, Prime Video, and Plex.

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