It's not hard to imagine how Ben Affleck was convinced to sign on to The Accountant. āHey Benny!ā director Gavin OāConnor shouted into the phone, probably. āGotta real good movie for ya. So this accountant guy, heās just like Good Will Hunting, but also heās Batman!ā
āIām in,ā grunted Affleck, and voila! Movie magic is made. The problem, though, isnāt that The Accountant is two ill-matched movies smooshed togetherāitās actually more like five or six, and none of them are thought-out enough to carry the day.
Letās start with the movie Anna Kendrickās in, some sort of romantic comedy. She works at the robotics company that hires Affleckās mysterious man of numbers to pinpoint a discrepancy in the books. Sheās intrigued by his brusqueness, his wicked skills with a magic marker, his superhero bod, his charmingly dented lunch thermos. Soon sheās whisked off on a crazy adventure that involves high-priced art and cold-blooded assassins. This movie peters out after about 20 minutes and Kendrick disappears from the screen altogether.
Then thereās the drab, dry movie J.K. Simmons is in. Heās a US Treasury agent seeking a fellow whoās been photographed with some very dangerous criminals, and also he has a secret from his past, and also heās the gruff, fatherly mentor to Cynthia Addai-Robinsonās younger, smarter agent, and also heās blackmailing her, too.
Meanwhile, thereās a Beautiful Mind-type movie happening as well, about a young boy with autism, simultaneous to Affleckās movie about a ludicrously deadly vigilante math whiz on the run, and also thereās a showdown at a villainās lair thatās like the end of Road House, and then thereās the annoyingly predictable family drama about two damaged brothers.
None of these movies is particularly good, but to experience them all at once is discombobulating. Whatever numbers game The Accountant is playing, it doesnāt add up.