In the near-decade since it came out, The Accountant has become a Dad Movie classic, beloved (some might say inexplicably) by anyone looking for something to watch on cable on a Sunday afternoon. That story of Christian Wolff (Ben Affleck), an extremely neurodivergent bookkeeper for all manner of illicit villains, who also just so happens to be an expert operator and notorious hitman, was sort of a self-serious dirge that never really squared its tone with the absurdity of its premise. Mercifully, the same sin isn’t committed in this sequel, aptly named The Accountant 2, which contains some wild tonal whiplash and considerably ups the ante as far as absurdity goes, as well as adding a dose of very welcome, albeit somewhat uncharacteristic, humor.
As the film opens, it’s eight years after the events of the original, and we start with Christian’s former government collaborator, Ray King (J.K. Simmons), meeting with mysterious female assassin Anais (Daniella Pineda) before they’re ambushed. She disappears, and King is taken out by the bad guys, but not before he manages to write “Find the Accountant” on his arm, which leads his former colleague Marybeth Medina (Cynthia Addai-Robinson) to track down Wolff and unravel the mystery that King was chasing. Christian immediately decides that he’ll need the help of his long-lost brother Braxton (Jon Bernthal), with whom he tentatively reunited during the last movie, but who he still holds at arm’s length. Braxton is also an internationally renowned hitman. So, for those keeping score, that means there are now three main characters in a movie titled The Accountant (2) who are famous contract killers, and, spoiler alert, nobody does any accounting. At all. For viewers who judge that fundamental misnomer to be a feature rather than a bug, you will probably enjoy this movie.
A significant portion of the runtime here is devoted to Christian and Braxton’s relationship (or lack thereof), as both are longing for some kind of human connection that otherwise eludes them. It’s handled with a bizarre degree of silliness, which frankly is a welcome texture for the material. Go ahead and lean into scenes like Braxton psyching himself up to convince a woman to let him adopt a corgi puppy, or an extended opening scene of Christian going to a speed dating event. The thing is, goofy as this all may sound, Affleck and Bernthal are both charming and idiosyncratic actors, and this tough sell mostly works thanks to their charisma. Then there’s a subplot expanding on Christian’s charitable foundation for other neurodivergent children, something revealed late in the first film, which here is revealed as this hyper-wealthy assassin’s private academy for students who secretly run his entire operation, a team of high-functioning superhackers that resemble nothing so much as the X-Men to Affleck’s Professor X. It’s profoundly ludicrous, and indeed it doubles down on what many would argue is the ableist trope of autism or other conditions bestowing “superpowers” on these sorts of characters.
Suffice it to say, all of this leads to some fairly extreme tonal whiplash. The Accountant 2 is the kind of movie that features a pretty funny scene where Christian goes country line dancing, but then also delivers one where a bunch of trafficked orphans are led to a mass grave. For the most part, the impossibility of executing this is actually managed fairly well, largely because both the brothers’ comedic relationship and the action movie sides of the film function pretty well on their own. Where mileages will vary is with regard to how well these distinct halves cohere and find balance. Speaking of which, returning director Gavin O’Connor does a carpenter’s job of the many fistfights that are peppered throughout the film, and he does especially well with a sturdy tactical firefight climax. The cutting is patient but not slow, and the shots render the rambunctious choreography legibly and fluidly. It’s solid stuff, sold well, and in the end, it helps this whole hokey affair become an unexpectedly amusing experience. These grace notes of genre filmmaking won’t be enough to convince everyone of the overall vision, but at the very least, they offer a nice distraction for the otherwise disinclined.
DIRECTOR: Gavin O’Connor; CAST: Ben Affleck, Jon Bernthal, J.K. Simmons, Cynthia Addai-Robinson; DISTRIBUTOR: Amazon MGM Studios; IN THEATERS: April 25; RUNTIME: 2 hr. 5 min.
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