The Amateur (2025) * * *

 

Directed by:  James Hawes

Starring:  Rami Malek, Laurence Fishburne, Holt McCallany, Rachel Brosnahan, Caitriona Balfe, Julianne Nicholson, Michael Stuhlbarg

CIA analyst Charles Heller (Malek) has a job he loves and a wife he loves even more.  However, his life is shattered when his wife is killed during a terrorist attack in London.  His grief is evident, but his desire for revenge more so.  He demands from CIA Assistant Director Frank Moore (McCallany) that he be trained and be allowed to locate the terrorists who killed his wife.  Moore is less than receptive to this, but relents and allows Charles to train under Henderson (Fishburne), who understands quickly that Charles isn't the assassin type.  

Moore is using Charles' "training" as a way to cover up the agency's use of the same terrorists on other black ops jobs, and figures Charles would be killed before anything happens.  He underestimates Charles' desire and his wherewithal to use other methods to kill his targets, including somehow setting explosives underneath a rooftop hotel pool to collapse it, and using pollen to subdue one who is allergic.  We can sympathize with Charles and his quest for vengeance.  He hooks up with an informant (Balfe) who has been providing him information for years anonymously and goes to work.  

Meanwhile, there is agency intrigue, in which the director (Nicholson) suspects Moore is lying to her about Charles and even more about the agency's involvement in using terrorists to carry out missions.  McCallany gives yet another strong performance as an authority figure with something to hide.  Fishburne's Henderson is ambivalent towards Charles from the jump, so we know he will not be able to dispose of them when ordered.   Poor Brosnahan is relegated to flashbacks when we know she can do so much more.   

The Amateur gets the job done.  The finale is yet another one in which the hero is able to kill the underlings throughout the film without issue, but when he has his chance to shoot the main villain, he is unable to do so.  But, perhaps Charles was playing chess, and knows killing the baddie will not serve the greater good of bringing down Moore as well.