'Flashy gunfire ballet' not enough to save 'Havoc'

An ultraviolent piece of havoc, it’s actually called Havoc, is coming at you on Netflix, starring Tom Hardy, Forest Whitaker and Timothy Olyphant.

One for the John Wick crowd, it’s full of – I quote – “flashy gunfire ballet” and “rustic hand-to-hand explosions of violence” by the master of this sort thing, Welshman Gareth Evans.

Evans is all about getting his violence up-close and personal. He’s best known for a couple of spectacularly bloody martial-arts films, both called The Raid and set in Indonesia.

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This one’s set in an unnamed American city (actually Cardiff) and it stars Tom Hardy.

The glowering Hardy has been promising big things for years – in films like Inception, The Dark Knight Rises and Mad Max. But he’s never quite made it to the A league – despite, or because of, his enthusiasm for method acting.

Here he plays a jaded homicide detective confronted by a murder.

A murder? What am I saying? There are dozens of them, mostly Asian and heavily dusted in cocaine.

The prime suspect is handed to Hardy on a plate - the son of a former gangland kingpin turned politician.

I still like Forest Whitaker, even if Hardy is starting to wear out his welcome.

And I really like Timothy Olyphant, who wears his old-school, Hollywood stardom lightly, mostly on TV. Apart from anything, he can be funny. Unlike Hardy.

But the star of the film is neither Olyphant nor Hardy, it’s writer-director Evans. And like this sort of thing or not, Evans is clearly brilliant at any movie called Havoc.

For a start, he takes his time setting up the rival forces – I hesitate to call them “characters” as such - young punks, ruthless triad killers, cops dirty and clean.

The first half is punctuated with some bits of action – including a car-chase that’s terminated when someone heaves a washing-machine through the windscreen of a police car.

But Evans is saving his powder for the second half, which is entirely action.

There’s no point judging Havoc as drama – despite Hardy’s pretensions – or even as an action-adventure – despite Olyphant’s star-presence.

It’s purely physical, visual and visceral – equal parts kung-fu, Grand Theft Auto and Bolshoi Ballet.