Who’s Ready for ‘The Accountant 2’?
Today’s action flicks are ridiculous; why not go for the gusto with the further adventures of Ben Affleck’s autistic CPA ninja warrior?
Back in April, the most popular film on Netflix was The Accountant. Subscribers were not clicking on new work like Zack Snyder’s damn-the-budget Star Wars fanfic Rebel Moon or Adam Sandler’s Spaceman. Instead, they wanted a 2016 thriller best remembered for all the popcorn it unintentionally caused audience members to spit out in baffled laughter.
In different circumstances, this could be a good thing. The somewhat random way streamers are serving up movies and series from the past for reconsideration has potential. But while The Accountant is far from your average action flick, that does not make it a diamond in the rough. Looking back from today’s more scrambled filmmaking and -watching environment, it stands out now as a prediction of the bonkers action aesthetic to come.
A high-concept bit of preposterousness, The Accountant takes its very silly story very seriously. Ben Affleck plays Christian Wolff, an accountant who works out of a strip mall in downstate Illinois, finding deductions for local farmers. Or does he? We know Christian is a high-functioning autistic due to an opening scene with a tic-prone child whose inability to deal with small talk resembles Affleck’s dour-faced pocket-protector of a glowering adult. We also know Christian is more than he claims to be, after a parallel storyline in which Treasury Department honcho Ray King (J.K. Simmons) assigns Agent Medina (Cynthia Addai-Robinson) to uncovering the identity of a mysterious forensic accountant for terrorists and cartels.
The storylines, including another spliced in about a jokey mercenary (Jon Bernthal, working overtime to bring some energy), come together when Christian is hired by inventor Lamar Black (John Lithgow) to find out why money has gone missing at his robotics firm. When forces unknown threaten whistleblower Dana (Anna Kendrick), she and Christian hit the road. Along the way, Christian’s secrets spill into the open almost as quickly as the rounds fly from his arsenal of weaponry — the sniper rifle firing anti-aircraft rounds makes a particularly convincing argument against those with whom he has disagreements.
The more is learned about Christian, the more improbable he becomes. The idea of this stone-boring CPA hiding a secret life with his drab ranch home and OCD has promise. But although the film imagines itself empathetic about autistic people, it just reinforces the savant stereotype. Imagine Rain Man’s math genius repackaged into the chassis of a CPA ninja warrior who could take on two or three X-Men without breaking a sweat.
True, cinema has never seen a forensic-accounting montage like the one The Accountant delivers with such gusto. But having Christian’s money-hunting skills referred to as “supernatural” smells just a bit of overkill. Once Christian steps into his secret lair — an Airstream mobile home packed with stacks of foreign cash, passports, the odd original Renoir or Pollock, and enough weaponry to outfit the full Rambo franchise—it’s clear we have passed into the realm of the comic book. After watching Christian dismantle massive criminal conspiracies in hours, shoot and stab and backflip an endless procession of hired guns into the afterlife, and show an unexpected soft side toward the tiny little bird-like young woman under his protection, one wonders why this Mary Sue wasn’t also given the power of flight.
That sensibility flows through the dialogue, which alternates between hackneyed and purple. Folding three films’ worth of plot into one ludicrous package, the surprisingly sentimental script by Bill Dubuqe (The Judge) doesn’t know when to shut up.
Gavin O’Connor’s direction is taut as it was with Warrior, though more attuned to bone-cracking beats than emotional subtlety. The performances are similarly professional, particularly Bernthal’s smartass delivery, which seems tailor-made for a Shane Black project. But there is only so much mileage in the jaw-droppingly unbelievable plot twists and Affleck’s stony countenance.
After all this, and with news that The Accountant 2 is moving ahead, you might be thinking: Sounds promising. There is something to that. Is there anything in The Accountant more absurd than the John Wick or similarly self-serious Equalizer series? Not particularly. It’s a bull market for the cinematically ridiculous.
If nothing else, The Accountant can be viewed alongside Affleck’s Batman work as showing there is a place for the blocky, stiff style he uses in his “serious” work (unlike the looser butt-of-the-joke comedic style he used well in Air): Inhabiting emotionally stunted overachievers with anger management issues who too easily resort to violence. One might say we have plenty of those stories already.
But the Netflix audience has spoken.
A version of this article was originally published in Film Journal International.
Title: The Accountant
Director: Gavin O’Connor
Cast: Ben Affleck, Anna Kendrick, J.K. Simmons, Cynthia Addai-Robinson, Jon Bernthal, John Lithgow, Jeffrey Tambor, Alison Wright
Studio: Warner Bros.
Year: 2016
