American Assassin Review: 2 Ups & 8 Downs

5. It's Needlessly Gory

Well-executed gore can greatly enhance a movie when it's done right, but this is a textbook example of a movie that's brutally violent for no sake but its own, and proof that an R rating doesn't automatically make a movie superior.

Right from the opening vacation slaughter sequence, this film features nauseatingly over-the-top violence which feels sadistic, fetishistic and ultimately at odds with the clear "grounded" tone it otherwise wants to strike (but routinely fails to).

There's little satisfying about the kills here: the film is too serious for all the murder to be "fun", and the blood-letting is far too over-the-top to be believable within this context.