The Beekeeper

In cinemas now

The only reason I had the misfortune of watching Jason Statham’s latest ‘thriller’ is because it was selected for a mystery screening at my local cinema. Nonetheless, The Beekeeper did lead me to muse on the mysterious box-office phenomenon that is Statham’s career.

With an estimated net worth of $90 million, the British actor is unquestionably one of Hollywood’s most bankable action stars. And yet, the vast majority of his films are virtually indistinguishable from each other, with the general formula involving Statham playing an invulnerable badass that is capable of felling multiple people at a time and the cast including at least one functioning alcoholic (in the case of The Beekeeper, that honour goes to Emmy Raver-Lampman’s dispensable FBI detective).

Oddly, this premise has sustained the interest of audiences for well over 20 years, as was evidenced by the fact that there wasn’t a single walkout at last night’s mystery screening (there was during the last one, Anatomy of a Fall, although that says more about the taste of Walsall’s cineastes than it does anything else). Clearly, there’s still a market for this retrograde homage to the sort of flicks that made Schwarzenegger and Stallone household names in the 1980s.

As for The Beekeeper, it is as preposterous as its title suggests and includes kill scenes involving a jar of honey, which is just about the only thing I can remember about it less than 24-hours after watching it. For director David Ayer, whose previous credits include Training Day (screenwriter) and the underrated End of Watch, it is the latest in an increasingly long line of flops, although the enduring allure of his leading man might result in a healthy box office return.