The Last Mercenary (2021) is a French action-comedy that is available on Netflix. The screenplay feels like an attempt by Bollywood to give an action film with sentiments. A long lost father, who was the top-secret agent (Richard Brumère or The Mist) in the country, gone rogue and now a mercenary, coming back from hiding to protect his only son (Archibald), who has lost his government given cover and protection. The film gets a mangoidiots rating of ‘Raw’ for some good action sequences by Jean-Claude Van Damme, whose appearance reminds me of Pradeep Rawat of Ghajini’s fame.
Archibald’s secret identity is being misused by a bad guy who plans to put the country in danger with the help of a top bureaucrat and the Mist has to identify and solve this case in order to exonerate his son. The Mist gets the help of his former teammates and is joined by Archibald friend & his sister, and by a stupid bureaucrat who acts as their insider man. If this description doesn’t reveal to you that the story is worn-out, repeated one the climax and the twist will certainly do.
It is good to see black actors being given important roles in a European film that is not centred around a black hero and to see the son of the hero being mixed-race (born to an Arab mother) – these show that the filmmakers are acknowledging the reality of today’s European society – a welcome development.
Overall, this is a timepass film.
The Last Mercenary (2021)
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