The Beekeeper

Story: A beekeper is on a mission to exact revenge for a defenseless phishing scam victim. And he will stop at nothing.

Review: Eloise Parker (Phylicia Rashad), a retired school teacher loses all her money at the click of a button, as a sophisticated network of young hackers rob her of over 2 million dollars. Her daughter is an FBI Agent Verona Parker (Emmy Raver-Lampman), but is helpless in catching these tech-savvy thugs. Enter Adam Clay (Jason Statham) - a beekeeper by profession, who runs his modest business from Eloise Parker’s rented garage, but is single-handedly capable of destroying the biggest and the most elusive phishing mafia that is out of the reach for even the most elite law enforcement organisations.

‘The Beekeeper’ starts off with a bang, promising a heavy dose of slick action and a new kind of enemy who is young, smart and commits their crime without using force or violence. But they destroy lives anyway. This premise is exciting and has immense scope to deep dive into a story about new-age scams that have become a sad reality of our life. But far from going deep, ‘The Beekeeper’ barely manages to even skim the surface. Director David Ayer and his writer Kurt Wimmer make no effort to explain the intricacies of how a group of young techies wipe off millions of dollars daily from people's bank accounts from a plush high-tech office and remain untraceable. Neither are they interested in showing us the scam itself in detail. It merely serves as a motivation and a reason for our man Adam Clay to unleash mayhem on the bad guys and go all guns blazing.

Like most high-octane actioners, ‘The Beekeeper’ too succumbs to preposterous and illogical happenings. However, the one thing that keeps this one fresh and brimming with entertainment is Jason Statham’s solid kicks and punches and the novel action choreography (by Gabriel Beristain). Right from the start, the action is the one element that remains unpredictable, even when the writing falters. The sweet satisfaction of a bloody revenge for those who have little regard for other people’s hard-earned money, is rewarding to watch. This keeps the narrative on track even when most characters come across as bumbling stereotypes. Thankfully, the leading man Jason Statham doesn’t seem to have lost his sheen. The actor can still pack a punch.

‘The Beekeeper' is a gripping action thriller for most part, with a fresh narrative of vengeance. A more pronounced emphasis on the crime and its execution could have made this stinging revenge drama far more lethal.