A stoic man’s isolated existence on an abandoned island off Scotland is threatened when he’s detected by British secret services in Shelter, debuting in Prague cinemas this weekend after premiering in the States last week. This assembly-line Jason Statham thriller delivers what its audience has come to expect during a handful of exciting action sequences, but a languid pace and some sloppy storytelling make it tough to recommend to anyone beyond genre fans.
Statham stars as Martin Mason—though we don’t learn his name until halfway through the movie—a man of few words who lives alone with his German Shepherd in an abandoned lighthouse on a deserted Scottish island. He lives off supplies delivered every month by young Jessie (Bodhi Rae Breathnach) and her determined uncle (Michael Shaeffer), though he steadfastly refuses any attempt at communication from the girl.
This rather pitiful existence is threatened when a storm sinks the uncle’s trawler, trapping him inside and sinking him to the briny depths. Mason manages to pull Jessie out of the water, but with a nasty leg wound that will require a trip to the mainland to obtain some antibiotics. Even worse: the girl still insists on getting to know him.
Shelter spends an unusual amount of time detailing THEA, the system used by British secret services to identify Mason, as MI6 Director Manafort (Bill Nighy) is grilled over privacy concerns and is relieved of his position by the Prime Minister (Harriet Walter)—but retained to oversee past projects. New MI6 head Roberta (Naomi Ackie) unwittingly springs him back into action when Mason is flagged on CCTV.
This state-of-the-art facial recognition technology is laboriously over-explained to us, even though we saw the same stuff being used as long ago as 1998’s Enemy of the State and as recently as last year’s Black Bag. The end result is a lot of Bourne-like politicking as different secret service departments now compete to rein in multiple rogue agents—in addition to Mason, Manafort has apparently given assassin Workman (Bryan Vigier) carte blanche to kill everyone in sight.
Who is Mason? Why is he in hiding? Shelter spills the beans after nearly an hour, but you’ve probably already guessed what’s going on here, or no longer care. In either case, the climactic revelations are nowhere near strong enough to justify structuring the narrative in this way. Shelter is essentially The Bourne Identity, only Mason knows who he is and just ain’t telling us—dumping the mystery angle would have freed up the narrative to be a much more compelling (if conventional) Statham actioner.
While we’re waiting on the ponderous story to explain itself, Shelter delivers the goods in a series of genuinely well-constructed action sequences, the first of which features Mason going Home Alone and springing traps on the commandos who infiltrate his lighthouse hideaway. As Mason takes it on the lam in order to protect Jessie, a tense farmhouse shootout, some suburban combat, and a nightclub firefight punctuate the remainder of the movie.
These action sequences are especially well-staged and choreographed in the mold of the John Wick movies, but ultimately come off as fleeting moments of fun drowning in a sea of unnecessary exposition. Still, the action packs an undeniable punch; stuntman-turned-actor Vigier, who goes toe-to-toe against Statham in multiple engaging hand-to-hand combat scenes, is a standout as the relentless assassin on his trail.
Shelter is the second film from director Ric Roman Waugh to hit cinemas in recent weeks following Greenland 2: Migration, and easily the more accomplished of the two; still, the filmmaker has failed to recapture the magic of his top-tier prison dramas Felon and Shot Caller despite working with a larger canvas. A lot of that comes down to basic storytelling fundamentals; so much of this movie revolves around Mason’s attempts to protect the young girl, but why her safety is even in question is never sufficiently explored.
Shelter ultimately plays to Statham’s familiar strengths without finding a compelling new angle on the lone-man-against-the-system formula. The action is staged with clarity and force, and several sequences crackle with the kind of physical immediacy that the star’s fans expect, but the bloated exposition and sluggish pacing undercut its momentum. What remains is a serviceable, intermittently exciting thriller that will satisfy genre loyalists while offering little reason for anyone else to seek refuge here.
