“We should go.”
Christian Wolff was a unique child. Sensitive to light and loud noises he had difficultly accepting defeat, losing emotional control when something wasn’t finished. Diagnosed with a unique sense of autism, he grew up to work as an accountant, a field that utilized his desire to solve every problem - but beneath that is an army brat who received the best training available, and a boy like Christian never lets a skill go to waste.
Slow out of the gate Gavin O’Connor’s The Accountant suffers mightily from lucid pacing and an unusual lack of direction. A hodgepodge of scenes collectively set the stage for Christian’s childhood, showcasing his struggle to cope with his mother’s departure and his father’s ruthless parenting style. At times intense, at times coarse, the scenes play out fine; but you never feel connected with the mathematician as he works the books of some of the most unforgiving men - somehow living to recall it.
Instead of enjoying the moment you long for what is set to come next; painfully greeted with a somewhat cliché side story involving the Treasury Department and a prized recruit’s thought-to-be-sealed past. Unoriginal and a bit amateurish for those involved here, you can’t help but become frustrated with their involvement.
Affleck, for what it is worth, does perfectly fine as Wolff. Dark, stern and a bit of a reclusive, the numbers genius spends his days behind the cover a small CPA office, his nights banging out to loud music as he rolls out his shins with a thick wooden rod. The routine is bizarre to say the least, though you find yourself forgetting the absurdity as you fixate on the immense amount of security the man has outside of his home.
A steady stream of flashbacks attempt to forge together the puzzle of Christian’s upbringing, but O’Connor is never able to fully grasp his central subject. The attempt at shock-and-awe backfires as the director is unable to connect past and present, sacrificing Wolff’s development for the sake of the overall film - which sadly doesn’t deliver as one would hope.
Anna Kendrick is harshly underused as Dana Cummings, a low level accountant (and art enthusiast) who discovers something unusual in the books at her company. Her discovery prompts the hiring of Wolff, who overnight is able to locate a $61 million embezzlement; thus setting off a lazy and half-assed chase sequence that begins (and ends) without much juice.
O’Conner continues the occasional split to the Treasury Department, making you question your allegiance as Marybeth Medina begins to close in (within two weeks) on a man whom they have been searching for for years. The diversions are not terrible; however, they offer little entertainment as you find yourself restless for more action, story development and badassery. Most of that never comes.
The final confrontation is somewhat of a joke, making you trice glance at your watch as you sit and ponder the many ways that The Accountant could have handled things better. O’Conner successfully nails the dark tone and visual aesthetics that help to give the film a sharp and intense vibe but fails to materialize his story. He has made a name for himself in regard to pushing genre boundaries and giving us a unique experience. He successfully did that here, just not an experience worth having.
