Hunter Killer (NC16)

Starring Gerard Butler, Gary Oldman, Common, Linda Cardellini, Toby Stephens

Directed by Donovan Marsh

In case you don’t speak military, a hunter killer is a submarine that tracks down and destroys other submarines.

Gerard Butler plays the captain of one such war machine, and Toby Stephens is the Navy Seal the skipper teams up with to rescue the Russian president, who’s been held hostage by a rogue general. If they don’t succeed, WWIII awaits.

The poster says the movie is “from the producers of Fast & Furious, Olympus Has Fallen and London Has Fallen” when it should really say “based on the movies produced by Jerry Bruckheimer”.

Hunter Killer is a unwieldy Franken-Movie, put together using spare parts off Crimson Tide, The Rock and Black Hawk Down, but the sum of the those parts is less than the whole.

Blame it on director Donovan Marsh’s workmanlike approach to his material. There’s a lot of action — under the sea, on land, in the war room — but strangely not a lot of excitement and tension. This movie can really use some Michael Bay TNT seasoning.

The biggest disappointment is Oldman. He receives top billing despite doing very little as the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, phoning in a very '90s Gary Oldman performance: shouty. Pity the movie’s nothing to shout about. (**1/2)

Photo: Golden Village