Gunner (2024)

1 1/2 Stars (out of 4)

Bottom of the Barrel

By Jeffrey M. Anderson

Far more interested in shooting and fights than it is in characters or ideas, Dimitri Logothetis's generic action/thriller Gunner can't even get that much right, preferring a choppy, incoherent look and sluggish pacing.

Lee Gunner (Luke Hemsworth) is a decorated war hero who has become estranged from his family due to extended absences. In an effort to re-connect, he invites his sons, teen Tyler (Connor DeWolfe) and younger brother Luke (Grant Feely), on a camping trip. The boys' uncle Jon (Barry Jay Minoff), Lee's brother-in-law, comes along.

In the woods, they stumble upon a large drug operation, and are attacked. Uncle Jon is killed, and Tyler and Luke are kidnapped. Lee uses his military training to dispatch most of the attackers, but during the fight, the DEA arrives and takes away most of the drugs. The drug lord, Dobbs (Mykel Shannon Jenkins), gives Lee an ultimatum: get the drugs back or his sons will die.

Lee cooks up a crazy idea. To get his own bargaining chip, he breaks into prison and kidnaps Dobbs's father, Ryker (Morgan Freeman), the real mastermind behind the drug operation.

Directed by Logothetis (of Jiu Jitsu infamy), Gunner wouldn't even exist if the characters had merely talked to each other. Apparently Lee would rather keep his family estranged that merely explain why it was he was gone for so long. (He says it would merely be "whining.")

Then, conversely, the only other emotional gut-punch in the movie, the death of Lee's oldest son, is described in dialogue; it has no real impact. The motivations of the villains are likewise nonsensical, and seem to be occurring just to keep the movie going, rather than operating through logic.

When we get to the big showdown, it's practically impossible to even tell what's going on; it's a sludgy, jumpy mess, often accompanied to the weirdest music imaginable. Finally, when this one-man-army is all done with his battle, leaving behind an incredible wake of destruction, there are no consequences. He even gets a most improbable job offer!

The movie's most intriguing sequence comes after Lee breaks Ryker out of prison and are driving to the big showdown. There's an attempt to talk about fatherhood and what it all means, but Lee keeps angrily shooting Ryker down, the conversation killed before it even had a chance to start. Plus Lee comes out looking like a jerk. In truth, Gunner would have been better if it were a "goner."