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The Beekeeper stars Jason Statham (Expend4bles) as Adam Clay, a man who… keeps bees! And if you have a problem, he’ll solve it!
Clair Huxtable (Phylicia Rashad – Creed III) is scammed by some online dodgy blokes in the most ridculous of RGB-lit setups – AND based in the US, whereas it’s more realistic that it’s some grotty office in a back street in Nigeria.
Given how it quickly affects her, Clay takes it upon himself to visit their HQ, with a declaration that he’s going to burn it to the ground, wisecracking to the staff that “it might be a good time to go home”, as he pours petrol all over the place, and I’m just left wondering why the cops aren’t instantly hounding him for attempted murder.
But then he could be considered to be untouchable, since even though he’s “The Beekeeper” and fulfils that role, it appears to also be a term similar to being “The Godfather”, also with a lot of muffled voices in the rather bad sound mixing.
In this movie, everyone wants our lead hero dead, leading to a lot of punching, shooting, deaths and a number of monumentally stupid cops and army types. It’s also amusing that rather than retain a baddie’s rifle and return fire, he’d rather use a rope to disable the rifle from another and burn them with one-liners!
Plus, in seeking vengeance, Clay’s actions are often stafferingly sadistic, apart from, perhaps, one man who he attacks with a stapler(!)
And given the way he just walks into some places, cool as you like without being spotted, it’s like he’s channelling Agent 47 from the Hitman games.
Meanwhile, young Derek Danforth (Josh Hutcherson – Five Nights at Freddy’s) thinks Wallace Westwyld (Jeremy Irons, as Jeremy Irons) can put him in touch with a hitman to sort this out, even though Clay is quite adept at going to some staggering levels of self-destruction of his own property, in order to show up some two-bit baddies with itchy trigger fingers.
Don’t expect much greatness from the script, however, as one cop quizzes along the lines, “Is it the same guy who did (one sorting out of bad guys) the same one who did (creating havoc elsewhere)?” Well, duh!
And a lot of the early dialogue between cops Verona Parker (Emmy Raver-Lampman) – daughter of Huxtable – and Matt Wiley (Bobby Naderi – Under The Shadow) in the form of ‘witty banter’, as if they haven’t got a real job. Plus, Jeremy Irons (The Flash) has fun chewing the scenery, as does Jemma Redgrave (Doctor Who) as the American President… of the same company, as well as being Derek’s Mum.
Additionally, Minnie Driver (Cinderella 2021) appears as the CIA Director, yet blink and you’ll miss her, as she clearly only turned up for five minutes of filming.
However, if there’s any mystery, it would be: Why do the police still use ’80s-style green-screen monitors as if they’re still programming on Tandy TRS-80 computers?!
Overall, The Beekeeper is Statham-by-numbers. It’s a lot of fun with many rewatchable fights, even if it does very little that’s original, and given that it probably has a low budget, expect sequels.
The Beekeeper is in cinemas from Friday, and isn’t yet available to pre-order on Blu-ray or DVD. However, once announced, it will appear on the New DVD Blu-ray 3D and 4K releases UK list.
Detailed specs:
Cert: 
Running time: 102 minutes
Release date: January 12th 2024
Studio: Sky Cinema
Aspect Ratio: 2.39:1 (Codex ARRIRAW(4.6K))
Rating: 7/10
Director: David Ayer
Producers: Bill Block, Chris Long, Jason Statham, Kurt Wimmer
Screenplay: Kurt Wimmer
Music: Jared Michael Fry, David Sardy
Cast:
Adam Clay: Jason Statham
Agent Verona Parker: Emmy Raver-Lampman
Agent Matt Wiley: Bobby Naderi
Derek Danforth: Josh Hutcherson
Wallace Westwyld: Jeremy Irons
President Danforth: Jemma Redgrave
Director Janet Harward: Minnie Driver
Mickey Garnett: David Witts
Pettis: Michael Epp
Lazarus: Taylor James
Eloise Parker: Phylicia Rashad
Deputy Director Prigg: Don Gilet
Kelly Krane: Sophia Feliciano
Rico Anzalone: Enzo Cilenti
Anisette: Megan Le
Agent Kim: Dan Li
Detective Marquez: Georgia Goodman
Detective Chen: Derek Siow
AIC Bojorquez: Jay Rincon
Second-in-Charge Harris: Kojo Attah
Breedlow: Joe Urquhart
Lewis: Peter Brooke
Peltz: Martin Gordon
Debbie: Rebecca Jane Hazelwood
Reviewer of movies, videogames and music since 1994. Aortic valve operation survivor from the same year. Running DVDfever.co.uk since 2000. Nobel Peace Prize winner 2021.