The Accountant

Ben Affleck plays a forensic accountant who works mostly for criminals. When asked to do a ‘clean’ job for a big tech company trying to find some misplaced funds, he uncovers some dirty secrets and has to go on the run.

Take some half decent thriller action sequences, then smush them together with heaps of pointless exposition and backstory. Throw in a probably offensive take on autism and you end up with this befuddling mess.

The Accountant doesn’t take itself too seriously but in spite of this it’s hard not to laugh. When they say write about what you know, if you are a chartered accountant who can hit a melon with a sniper rifle from a mile away then perhaps they might sign you up for The Accountant 2.

Of course there’s no harm with a bit of escapism, but for very long stretches the screenplay dwells on long inconsequential scenes. It’s escapism if you were escaping to a desk job pushing spreadsheets.

A real accountant would have trimmed 30 minutes off the film and saved everyone some time and money.