Let’s get this out of the way: “Mr. Right” is a mess. It’s not a great movie. It’s all quirk and flash, with no logic and minimal real emotion.
But just accept that it’s a mess, because the sooner you do, the more quickly you’re going to start to kind of enjoy it.
In what she hopefully took as just a fun, YOLO side project, Anna Kendrick, a queen of quirk herself, stars as Martha, who wears quirky things like cat ears and pretzel-shaped earrings and does quirky things like attempt to fry whipped cream. After being cheated on by her boyfriend, who accuses her of having “no sense of adventure,” she tells her friends, “I wanna do something terrible,” like finding a block party with a contest where they “show, like, our boobs or something” (this is set in New Orleans, BTW).
That plan is abandoned, but it’s not long before “something terrible” arrives in a shower of boxes of condoms at the neighborhood store: a similarly quirky fella with a similarly quirky fashion sense who, oh, just happens to be a hitman.
But it’s fine, he’s a good hitman. He only kills the people who hire him. And people who threaten him. Or get in his way. Whatever.
The two hit it off right away. She tells him about how she abandoned her dream of going on a museum dig—she’s a paleontologist, because of course—for her terrible boyfriend. He casually mentions killing people and waterboarding a terrorist. She assumes he is kidding, and he doesn’t seem too concerned about making sure she understands. It’s fine.
Our Mr. Right is played by Sam Rockwell, who played that jerk who betrayed Drew Barrymore in “Charlie’s Angels,” but he’s about the only similarity between the two movies (the other being really great use of fun, catchy music). The action/danger plot here is loosely sketched—Mr. Right gets caught in the middle of some hitman-sibling rivalry, and there’s an ex-colleague (Tim Roth of “Lie to Me”) on his tail for some reason—and the protagonists are, too.
If you want to get really picky about it, Martha and Mr. Right have a totally red-flag relationship: Guy won’t tell girl his name (he says he hates it). Guy doesn’t listen when girl tells him to leave her house. Guy and girl bond over throwing knives at each other. When guy kills other guy in front of girl, girl goes home to angst but does not call police. By end guy and girl are happily killing people together. Uhhhhhh.
And the writing is facepalm-inducing, with gems like “Are you upset because I killed that guy?” and a little monologue about the sad, lonely life of a contract killer.
But weirdly, by the end, the absurdity settles in, the danger/action plot ramps up a little and everything becomes almost fun. Hitmen throw temper tantrums. Mr. Right and another hitman played by de facto Wu-Tang Clan leader RZA bond over gummy bears. Shots of blood flying through raindrops are oddly beautiful.
So hey, look. “Mr. Right” isn’t great, but Anna Kendrick is. Nothing good is coming out this week anyway, and you can watch this movie without even leaving your house. So why not? Embrace the mess and have a good time.
Not great, but it won’t kill you (ha). 1.5 stars.
Out Friday On Demand or in Digital HD, or see it at ArcLight Cinemas (1500 N. Clybourn Ave., 312-637-4760).