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Starring: Maggie Q, Michael Keaton, Samuel L. Jackson
OUR RATING: ★★★☆☆
Story:
Action thriller directed by Martin Campbell. The Protégé (2021) follows Anna (Maggie Q), a skilled contract killer who was rescued as a child by the legendary assassin Moody (Samuel L. Jackson), and who has taught her everything she knows. But when Moody is murdered, Anna vows revenge and becomes entangled with an enigmatic killer, Rembrandt (Michael Keaton), whose attraction to her goes way beyond cat and mouse, but their confrontation turns deadly, and the loose ends of a life spent killing weave themselves ever tighter.
Our Favorite Quotes:
'It is a rare gift to have a friend who trusts you enough not to try and help until you ask.' - Moody (The Protégé) Click To Tweet
Best Quotes
Don Preda: Exactly, who are you people?
Anna: We just find people who can’t be found.
Don Preda: The money. You’re going to have it maybe for an hour. Then we come take it back, cut you both into pieces, and feed you to my pigs. That doesn’t worry you?
Anna: No.
Don Preda: Why?
Anna: I didn’t come here for money. I came here for you.
[she stabs him in the neck]
Moody: [after Anna’s killed Don Preda] Didn’t take any, huh?
Anna: Take what?
Moody: Money. It was all there, right?
Anna: We were paid to eliminate a target. We did that.
Moody: Well, you know, three mil in dirty money, and nobody’s looking for them. Just saying.
Anna: You need to see a doctor about that cough.
Moody: Traditional, or a witch?
Anna: You? Definitely a witch.
Moody: I know just the voodoo queen to call.
Seema: Three weeks, and this is all you come back with?
Anna: You know sellers. They know you’ve come all that way, and they play hard to get.
Seema: Don’t you want to just kill people like that?
Claudia: [referring to Moody] So the other day, he says to me, “Seventy is the new thirty.”
Anna: Well, that’s just something old guys say.
Moody: [referring to his birthday candles] You skimped on the candles I see.
Claudia: Seventy would have been a fire hazard.
Moody: African limba. Nothing else sounds like it. I’d just about given up hope of finding one. How in the world did you?
Anna: You. You taught me how to find things that didn’t want to be found.
Moody: You know, one of the twins called me last night to say she was pregnant.
Anna: Daisy in Dover?
Moody: No, Daisy in Manchester. Daisy in Dover’s a dyke.
Moody: It is a rare gift to have a friend who trusts you enough not to try and help until you ask.
Anna: [referring to the heavyset keys] If you fell in a pond with those, you’d drown.
Moody: Well, if I fell in the pond without them, I’d probably float away.
Anna: What is that?
Moody: Those are the souls waiting for me on the other side. I’m sure they have a reception planned. I sent away so many prematurely. Either by my hand, or through you.
Anna: We never sent anyone away who didn’t have it coming.
Moody: Maybe. But, I’m sure there are quite a few spirits up there, waiting for me with a bone to pick.
Anna: Aw. You really believe you’re going up?
Moody: Don’t you?
Moody: I may have to go back to Vietnam. Be nice if you went with me.
Anna: I’m never going back there.
Moody: Our past is never where we left it, little chameleon. We all have scars. You stare at them long enough, you remember how you got them.
Rembrandt: I’m looking for a book. An old book. Like, rare.
Anna: Like, rare?
Rembrandt: Yeah.
Anna: Either they are, or they aren’t. Books aren’t like a steak. You can’t get them like medium-rare.
Rembrandt: That’s funny.
Anna: Sarcastic.
Rembrandt: Yeah, but funny.
'Our past is never where we left it.' - Moody (The Protégé) Click To Tweet
Rembrandt: I find you interesting. You’re interesting. And beautiful, sure. Not in that ornamental kind of way. It’s the interesting part that’s got me wondering.
Anna: Wondering what?
Rembrandt: How long after I give you my number will it take you to decide that I’m just as interesting and give me a call?
Anna: Twenty-seven minutes.
Rembrandt: That long?
Anna: First, I have to pretend to cancel my date, and then I have to feed my cat.
Rembrandt: That’s six.
Anna: The rest is me playing hard to get.
Billy Boy: I never thought I’d see you here again.
Anna: Well, maybe you’re not seeing me now.
Anna: Billy Boy. I mean, I know you run with all kinds, but now you’re running with stupid?
Billy Boy: How’s Moody?
Anna: He’s dead.
Billy Boy: [toasts] To Moody.
Anna: I have questions. You give me answers. If I’m satisfied, you’ll never see me again. If I’m not, I’ll be the last thing you ever see.
Rembrandt: [to Anna after she’s been captured by Duquet and his men] That was a long twenty-seven minutes. I’m still waiting for your call. It’s alright. I don’t take these things personally.
Rembrandt: [to Anna] I’m not going to lie to you. There’s not much chance this ends well for you.
Rembrandt: [to Anna] I’m sorry about your friend, Moody. I had no part of that. Or the firefight at the bookstore. I’m an “after-the-facts” guy. I come in and make sure there’s no loose ends. I look for things that might seem benign, but aren’t. Like a bookstore owned by an assassin. Boy, I never saw that one coming. I misread you completely.
Rembrandt: [to Anna] I’m your last line of defense. End of the road. There’s no more lifelines. You understand?
Rembrandt: [to Duquet] You guys kill me. You’re all the same. Shoot first and ask questions later.
'Nobody is as deaf as those who don't want to listen.' - Billy Boy (The Protégé) Click To Tweet
Rembrandt: [referring to Anna] She’s not going to run. She’s going to lick her wounds, then she’s coming after you.
Duquet: Good.
Rembrandt: Really? Because right now it’s four-zero. She’s winning.
Billy Boy: This is Vietnam, Anna. You know what it’s like here. You owe it to Moody to stay alive.
Anna: I know what I owe him.
Anna: Moody was beautiful. In his way. He was kind. And not through effort. It was just a part of who he was. He didn’t save my life, he gave me a life. He knew who I was, and what I’d become. And he protected me.
Billy Boy: Hayes has been dead for thirty years. Vohl is no longer. And you got some very bad people looking for you.
Anna: Lucas Hayes killed Moody. He knows I’m looking for him. His last known location is Saint Quiteria Hospital.
Billy Boy: Nobody is as deaf as those who don’t want to listen.
Rembrandt: [over phone] Wow. Four men dead and nothing on camera. Place looked like an abattoir. Was it the food?
Anna: You know, it was bad manners.
Rembrandt: Yeah, well, that’s no way to treat a lady.
Anna: Oh, I’m no lady.
Rembrandt: Well, I’m not always a gentleman myself.
Anna: I wouldn’t sell yourself short.
Rembrandt: Well, coming from you, that’s a compliment.
Trailer: