The first trailer for Paramount's new action-thriller The Contractor — starring Chris Pine and Ben Foster — really wants you to take note of the fact that it comes "from the producer of John Wick and Sicario," both original films that spawned franchises. But what it really is is an unexpected Hell or High Water reunion that seems to have a plot that is 90% similar to that of the movie Triple Frontier.
Pine plays an Army veteran named James Harper, who was involuntarily discharged and denied certain privileges. Bitter about being thrown under the bus, he decides to do right by his family and takes on a job as an independent contractor. Things go south when Harper is double-crossed, which forces him to go on the run as he finds himself at the center of a massive conspiracy.
Directed by Tarik Saleh, the Swedish filmmaker behind The Nile Hilton Incident, and a couple of Lykke Li music videos, The Contractor doesn't look like the sort of movie that immediately inspires confidence. It feels like something that would have been made maybe a decade ago, possibly even around the same time when Pine was flirting with his second potential franchise-starter, Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit. Better-looking films have been relegated to streaming in the last couple of years, but the fact that The Contractor will be released simultaneously in theaters and digital isn't doing it any favors.
That, and the mildly concerning subplot involving a Muslim scientist described as a "motivated radical" by someone who suggests the American mercenaries should "cowboy up" and get the job done.
Pine and Foster, of course, starred together in the excellent neo-Western Hell or High Water, which scored four Oscar nominations at the 89th Academy Awards. The Contractor also stars Gillian Jacobs, Fares Fares, Eddie Marsan, JD Pardo, Florian Munteanu, and Kiefer Sutherland, who, by the way, appears to have been cast in a self-aware move by someone who watched Phone Booth.
Written by J.P. Davis, the film arrives in theaters and on-demand on April 1. You can watch the trailer here, read the official synopsis, and check out the official poster down below:
Chris Pine stars in the action-packed thriller as Special Forces Sergeant James Harper, who is involuntarily discharged from the Army and cut-off from his pension. In debt, out of options and desperate to provide for his family, Harper contracts with a private underground military force. When the very first assignment goes awry, the elite soldier finds himself hunted and on the run, caught in a dangerous conspiracy and fighting to stay alive long enough to get home and uncover the true motives of those who betrayed him. Also starring Kiefer Sutherland, Ben Foster, Gillian Jacobs and Eddie Marsan.
