Formulas and Firearms: A "The Accountant" Review

I have never gotten along with Math, and it has been my least favorite subject for as long as I can remember. As if numbers weren’t confusing enough, some genius even added the alphabet into equations, making going through problem solving even more dreadful!

It was this love-hate relationship (okay, maybe mostly hate), with numbers that made me pretty sure that I’d be dozing off if I go see The Accountant (the title alone is making me cringe). However, this is one special case where I’m glad that my expectations weren’t met, because the film didn’t turn out to be the snooze fest that I thought it would be.

Christian Wolff is a math genius diagnosed with autism, who now works as an accountant servicing criminal organizations by “uncooking” their finances. Given the high-risk nature of his work, he takes on several aliases, and at some point also takes in a real client in order to seem like a legit, normal accountant. This client, is a robotics company called Living Robotics, and Christian finds out that $61 million have been misappropriated, putting the company’s CFO, Ed Chilton, as prime suspect. Now a hitman is after Wolff to take his life, not to mention that he has also taken the attention of the US Department of Treasury. Despite the predicament he is in, Christian is more than capable of defending himself, and proves that he is not just the ordinary accountant everybody thought he is.

The Accountant Trailer

The Accountant made solving equations and cooking financial books seem a whole lot more badass and exciting than it is in real life. To be fair, you didn’t have to be a math wiz to appreciate this film, as it’s also loaded with a fair amount of gun-action and hand-to-hand combat reminiscent of The Raid. Think of it as A Beautiful Mind, except that Russel Crowe’s character is also Batman at night (it works because Ben Affleck’s character in this movie is also mysterious, rich guy).

The film also tries so hard at injecting family drama and maybe, also raise awareness for struggles brought by autism, which I personally thought to be offered half-baked. If anything, Christian’s autism in the movie was presented as some sort of special skill which allowed him to be the badass killing machine that he is. I could be wrong but don’t you think that this is a bit misleading? The film may have used this to give the storyline some heart, but despite being a huge part of the plot, it was very much misrepresented that the movie may have been well off even without it.

But then again, you won’t leave the cinema thinking that you didn’t get your money’s worth. The Accountant is still worth the 2 hours, thanks to the remarkable performances of Ben Affleck, Anna Kendrick, and most especially J.K. Simmons whose presence in a movie seems to bring up its appeal several notches higher.

Hey, if somebody like me who hates numbers thinks that a movie about an accountant is badass, maybe it really isn’t so bad after all.

Rating: 3/5

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