⭐️⭐️⭐️ | Rated PG-13 | 123 minutes

Who doesn’t love a good revenge movie? Especially one that is as satisfying as this one. I won’t say everything goes our hero’s way, but he does well for himself with little to go on other than blind anger.

Rami Malek stars as Charles Heller, a CIA analyst hell bent on revenge after his wife is killed in a London terror attack. “The Amateur” is based on a book from 1981 by Robert Littell. The world the film is set in has been updated to modern times, giving Charles a leg up on the bad guys as he puts his computer hacking skills to good use.

Charles gets a crash-course in CIA agent training by blackmailing his supervisor – and that’s where Laurence Fishburne comes in, as Robert Henderson – Charles’ “handler” as he learns what it takes to be an agent.

This part of the film sorta flies by and feels incomplete, but we learn that Charles is for some reason especially skilled at building explosives. Of course, this will come into play in spectacular fashion a few times throughout the story.

Early in the film we’re introduced to a character played by Jon Bernthal, but we don’t see him again until a single scene much later in the film. Felt like there might be some additional lost scenes on the cutting room floor. This role was wasted because the few scenes that are present don’t really add to the story.

That said, the film is action-packed from beginning to end with a few stop downs as Charles’ finds ways to stay one step ahead of his blackmailed boss and Robert, who are both hot on his tail as he enacts his revenge on his wife’s killers.

Not unlike some of the death scenes in films like Final Destination, Charles is a hands-off killer, preferring to stage elaborate traps for his marks to try and escape. It’s a bit torturous at times too, knowing full well that escape is futile.

The film was shot all around London, France and Turkey, locations that add to the realism of the situations. It really helps to bring authenticity to the espionage of it all.

Malek perfectly captures the anxiety-riddled high-IQ computer-hacker-nerd of it all… he struggles in social situations at work and and in public and makes the viewer wonder if he’s going to pull any of his plan off. Fishburne is solid as Henderson, but I do wish he was featured in the film more than he was. His scenes often felt rushed.

Director James Hawes is relatively new to feature filmmaking, but draws on his television film experience here to take a sprawling story and focus it to feature film length. Even though there’s not a sequel to the book, I could see some franchise potential with this film – especially since you will surely be cheering for Malek’s Charles by the time the credits start to roll… leaving you wanting more.