The Accountant (2016)

Plot of The Accountant: A forensic accountant, Christian Wolff, is hired by the boss of a company which makes electronically assisted limbs for amputees. Some-one has been rifling the funds, a situation discovered by Dana Cummings, the company accountant. Wolff goes to work and finds in short order that $61 million has been stolen. In flashback we see that he was, in some way, autistic and that his father had had him and his brother trained in self defence and helped him learn how to take advantage of his capabilities. Also Wolff has helped a local couple with their accounts and has in return been able to use their land to practice with a sniper rifle. In the US Treasury a director, Ray King, has recruited an analyst, Marybeth Medina, to discover the identity of Wolff. Meanwhile, the CFO of the company, is threatened by a villain and is found dead. Wolff is paid off by the owner of the company, Lamar Blackburn, without finding who embezzled the funds, and finds himself targeted by hit men, and after disposing of a coupe of them realises that Dana is also at risk, and manages to save her. Realising that the hits must have been sanctioned by Blackburn, after taking Dana to safety he goes to Blackburn’s mansion to sort everything out.

Content: No sex or nudity, just a bit of social drinking. We see Christian as a boy throwing a fit because he has lost one piece of a jigsaw puzzle., and later him and his brother being trained in self defence. In the offices of Living Robotics he has 15 years of accounts available and overnight writing on white boards and the glass divisions analyses all the figures to come up with a result, which he shares with Dana. The Treasury people get a line on him, finding that he has an office which makes no money but that he owns a complete mall strip. Once combat starts Wolff uses his firearms and combat skills to overcome a whole load of villains, starting off by killing two with his sniper rifle. He takes Dana to an Airstream caravan, inside a storage unit which is full of all sorts of riches. The Treasury director is sort of linked to Wolff but needs to know who he is.

A View: The general public have liked this outing more than the critics did, but it has made money, and the characteristics of the character quite suit Ben Affleck’s acting style. I had a bit of a job accepting that an accountant, no matter how brilliant, could also be some sort of superhero, possibly carrying out hits on behalf of the mafia, in addition to finding out what their accounting problems might be.  But I do like characters who have some sort of special skill, and so it seems also do a lot of viewers. And despite what seems to be a complex plot it was easy to follow, so something you could have on while doing your knitting.

Fun Fact: The martial arts used in the film are said to be based on an Indonesian combat style known as Pencak Silat.