WANTED/NICE WORK

It would be easy to be jealous of Glasgow’s James McAvoy. He seems to have had an unusually easy ride since he kicked off on The Bill in the mid-nineties.

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He had a good crack at the big screen with Gilles McKinnon’s interesting war time drama Regeneration in 1997 and then started full time feature film work with Jeremy Wooding’s underrated Bollywood Queen and Stephen Fry’s similarly ambitious Bight Young Things in 2002 and 2003 respectively.

Not a bad record for a twenty two year old. Then add in 2004 appearances in the highly publicised Wimbledon and the successful indie pic Inside I’m Dancing and you had the feeling that this was a young man who was going to be around for awhile.

Even so, no one would have projected the heat that would be generated by his performance in 2005 in . The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.

Remember his role here was to play a faun, a departure which must have seemed like a brave career choice, whatever the reputation of the books.

But history since then has proved just what a volatile business film is, for McAvoy’s prancing has done far more for him that far more ballsy roles for his peers and he has gone on to make the award winning Last King Of Scotland; Penelope, which was distinctly less winning, except for his own performance; Starter For Ten, which will long be a British favourite; Becoming Jane, another squib but a story that attracted international attention; and, of course, the landmark tale Atonement.

Now comes Wanted, opposite Angelina Jolie, and here is where the jealousy ought to abate slightly. Because this is a film that underlines how difficult it is for rising stars like McAvoy to make the right career choices.

No one is going to pity McAvoy too much for having to snog Ms Jolie (main photo) from time to time.

But there is a suspicion that at times during filming when he (pictured above with director Timur Bekmambetov) may have wondered what he was going playing an assassin able to shoot bullets around corners.

The plot is not the big issue here. Action is. As timid McAvoy is recruited into the Fraternity, a secret society, which reveals to him that he has secret powers and send him forth to see justice done in the world, including revenge for his father's premature death, but may not be quite the good guys that they seem at first.

Did he really want to be involved in such a big budget, SFX film or was it something thrust upon him by managers and agents? How did he feel playing second fiddle to stunt men and CGI when he had just proved in Atonement that he deserved classical leading man status?

Whatever thoughts may have disturbed his sleep during the shooting, the results have proved entertaining, so he need not worry too much.

And his future still looks bright. Next up are The Last Station, looking at Tolstoy’s troubled career, and the lead role at Bilbo Baggins in Tolkien’s The Hobbit.

Wanted opens nationwide on Wednesday, June 25, 2008.

Posted June 15, 2008.