Film Review | The A-Team

FILM: THE A-TEAM (12)

RATING: THREE STARS

Somewhere in the recesses of our brain, The A-Team’s rousing-but-sprightly theme song lives on. While we lazily watched re-runs of the show with Italian dubs, it settled in our minds and refused to leave, and the mere mention of the show, even a picture of its iconic strongman BA Baracus (made legendary by, and made a legend of, Mr T), is enough to make it all come back – and you’ll be whistling it in no time, embarrassing yourself in front of colleagues or fellow public transport patrons.

So if there’s anything else the show will be remembered for, I would say it’s definitely that theme tune. But this would probably be untrue – the show is a bundle of idiosyncrasies: from its ridiculous stunts to the montages in which our rag-tag protagonists conjure up all sorts of elaborate weaponry out of scraps.

Director Joe Carnahan (Narc, Smokin’ Aces), in updating the very 80s material for the 21st century, shifts the Team’s origin stories from Vietnam to Iraq, as Hannibal Smith (Liam Neeson), Face (Bradley Cooper), Murdcok (Sharlto Copley) and B.A. Baracus (wrestler Quinton Jackson) are disgraced from their military titles for – in keeping with the original series – a crime they didn’t commit: having discovered, just a few days before the official end of the war on Iraq, that insurgents plan to manufacture counterfeit currency, Hannibal conjures up a plan to intercept them, only to be ambushed by members of the security firm Black Ops, who blow up a van carrying the plates in full view of the army. Stripped of their rank and sentenced to jail, the team bust out to plan their revenge, while criminal investigator and Face’s former love Charissa Sosa (Jessica Biel) chases them across the globe. 

If you ever need a definition for the expression ‘it does what it says on the tin’, Carnahan’s revamp would probably be one of the main contenders. The trailers promised an updated version of the show we know and love, and this is what we got. Yes, Mr T is missed, and a wrestler will never have the same level of charisma and salt-of-the-earth likeability but deep down, I’m sure everybody knew that already. What is definitely retained is the cartoony, over-the-top-but-bloodless action, and the story ambles along with a childish gusto that’s difficult to dislike. The plot is notable for one thing above everything else: it seems to be constructed entirely out of set pieces. Even a basic bit of backstory comes complete with an intricate escape plan involving lots of screaming and explosions. A particular set-piece is so brazen it deserves legendary status – yes, for those of you who have seen the trailer, I am talking about the tank-parachute – would that all action films were so bare faced with their intentions!

Luckily, the chemistry between the characters – so crucial to the entire project – is pretty well accounted for, Jackson’s blank-eyed Baracus notwithstanding. Neeson is solid enough as the craggy leader, but it’s Cooper and Copley (sounds like an accounting firm, doesn’t it?) who really set things alight. District 9’s Copley in particular –  who had proven his versatility in that South African high-concept sci-fi fest last year – rarely delivers a dull gag, despite the fact that his craziness is all over the place, while The Hangover’s Cooper exudes a different kind of humour, mixing in playboy charm with strategic wiliness.

Clocking in at 117 minutes, it is a tad overlong, and the rumble of exploding set pieces leads it to sag a little in the middle, but the finale twists and explodes deliciously. And when you’re having this much fun, who cares?