The Accountant * * 1/2

Ben tries to explain the plot to Anne

 Well it gets a bit much when the actors themselves seem to be giggling at the twist in the plot. At least that’s the way it came across as they summed up the situation.  But I guess it owes a lot to it’s name.  Accountants like everything summarised neatly and precisely so that column A doesn’t argue with column B.  If this film was subjected to an audit I don’t think it would do real well.  Fudged figures as they say.

   But anyway you wouldn't want to raise the issue with this accountant.  Because he’ll kill you. Because that’s what he does.

   It’s a strange, somewhat confusing film.  But basically it’s about an accountant called Chris Woolf (Ben Affleck) who has a small shopfront practice doing tax-returns for folks like you and me.  But on the side he has a whole other life: he launders money for gangsters - at least I think that’s what he does.  We don't see much of that. But he does talk to a mysterious English woman on the phone who gives him “jobs”.  We mostly see Ben expose accounting flaws in a firm which he is auditing and that sets off a chain reaction - of killing.

   The flaw was first exposed by a pretty junior accountant (Anna Kendrick doing her innocent thing).

    Meanwhile the Department of Finance or some Government Department are after him.  The boss (JK Simmons) engages a young girl to do the groundwork.  As she’s got a criminal background she’s good at it.

  Chris is just as handy with a gun and a karate kick as he is with figures.  We see plenty of him as a child.  He has Asperger's, Autism  and other issues. . His father, a military man, raised him and his brother to make them tough so they can look after themselves.  Perhaps he overdid it.  Seeing that Chris is also into self harm which he seems to practice each night with disturbing enthusiasm it’s a wonder he can fight at all.

   Talking of self-harm, that is pretty well what is wrong with this film. It pulls itself this way and that way, it makes complicated demands on itself, it makes itself twist to fit silly plot points. So silly you giggle at them with the actors.

  Otherwise it looks great.  It’s got some tough, hard hitting action sequences. I just wish I had been given a more clearly defined reason to cheer him on. Perhaps there is another way of looking at this.  I don't have Autism, but if did this might be my favourite film.