American Ultra review: bong ho action comedy puts Jesse Eisenberg and Kristen Stewart in a stupor

Freakin’ out... Jesse Eisenberg and Kristen Stewart in American Ultra Photograph: Alan Markfield/AP

Summer 2015: the year half-cocked, medium-budget spins on The Bourne Identity made their way to the American theaters. First there was Self/Less, in which an aging Donald Trump-ish developer transfers his consciousness into a Ryan Reynolds special forces fighter, and now there’s American Ultra.

Jesse Eisenberg plays Mike Howell, a convenience store clerk in Nowheresville, West Virginia, whose primary activities include tokin’ weed, being a bit of an anxious space-case and not-deserving his saintly girlfriend, Phoebe (Kristen Stewart). One day bad men come to eliminate Mike, but before they do a strange woman comes and “activates” him with a subliminal phrase. Instinctually, he knows how to turn a spoon into a killbot weapon. The very same one with which he was planning to slurp down some Ramen. Oh, man, I’m freakin’ out!

Mike is, naturally, a former CIA asset that has been deprogrammed, had his memory wiped and is now allowed to live a quiet life out in coal country. But sniveling toad Adrian Yates (Topher Grace, the best thing in this movie, and that’s a sentence I’ve never said before) is a CIA up-and-comer that wants to wipe the slate clean of these lingering agents. He sends in some strong men and, well, that’s when the bit with the spoon happens. There are escalations (Connie Britton represents the only one in Langley, Virginia with a conscience) and reveals (turns out K-Stew isn’t sticking with Mike just because she likes the stench of bongwater). The action sequences build in size, but it is a surprisingly tiresome affair.


Another hit men ... John Leguizamo and Jesse Eisenberg in American Ultra Photograph: Alan Markfield/AP

Part of Mike’s programming is that he’ll have a panic attack if he leaves town, so we in the audience are condemned to this one boring location along with him. A big set piece includes Mike and Phoebe racing off to their friend, a drug dealer played by John Leguizamo. No one quite phones in an annoying performance quite like Leguizamo. Not that he’s always terrible (see Spike Lee’s Summer of Sam for a good turn) but when he’s doing his cussin’, wigged-out schtick in supporting roles he’ll make you pray for a projector malfunction. (A loop of the character Freek from the 2009 Neveldine/Taylor dud Gamer is what would be waiting for me in Room 101).

There’s chasing, fighting, hiding, urgent telephone calls and the introduction of what screenwriting hacks these days call a “big bad.” It’s a fellow mindscaped agent called Laugher, unleashed to take down our cornered hero all the while cackling like The Joker. This sort of thing is typical of film-makers who have a surface understanding of what they eventually want on the screen, but no clue how to get there. Rather than trusting an actor (in this case Walton Goggins) to craft a memorable character, he’s burdened with a preposterous, comic book-like gimmick. (The rest of the movie, as silly as it is, is ultimately played as if it is the real world.) It’s a chump move indicative of the dry script by writer Max Landis (Chronicle) given absolutely zero spark by director Nima Nourizadeh (Project X).

Eisenberg and Stewart in American Ultra Photograph: Alan Markfield/AP

There are, however, a few decent moments in American Ultra. It’s nicely edited, which sounds like a backhanded compliment, but the sequences of convenience store tedium, flash-floods of memory and one big slo-mo shoot ‘em up showdown comes together in slick and engaging ways. (There are two credited editors. Bill Pankow has worked on a number of Brian De Palma’s better movies, and Andrew Marcus worked with Merchant-Ivory Films. These unlikely connections may at least secure American Ultra as an expert level entry in some extreme bar trivia some day.)

Unfortunately both Eisenberg and Stewart, both frequently brilliant, are on unsure footing here. The movie simply doesn’t know if it wants to be Jason Bourne or Cheech and Chong. A few comic throwaways work (few mutter quite like Eisenberg) but the thriller side of the picture is airless, as is the love story. There’s also a coda completely at odds with the thesis of the film, which I will not spoil, but leads me to wonder why we’re suddenly supposed to cheer for an organization we’ve been rooting against the whole time. Ultimately, American Ultra proves that it’s often best to let sleeping agents lie.