SHELTER (2026)

Starring Jason Statham, Bodhi Rae Breathnach, Bill Nighy, Naomi Ackie, Daniel Mays, Harriet Walter, Gordon Alexander, Bronson Webb, Tom Wu, Billy Clements, Tomi May, Anna Crilly, Bally Gill, Ryan Fletcher, Adam Collins, Sofian Francis, Bryan Vigier, Steven Blades, Louise Laag, Rodaidh Findlay, Erand Hoxha, Derek Carroll, Tom Delahunty and Andrew Fagan.

Written by Ward Parry.

Directed by Ric Roman Waugh.

Distributed by Black Bear Pictures. 107 minutes. Rated R.

For a good half-hour or so, Shelter treads some very different territory for a film starring Jason Statham.

Not all that much happened in these early, off-the-grid scenes in which Statham and his dog lived a solitary existence in a gorgeous Scottish lighthouse, only very occasionally interacting with his two closest neighbors, a fisherman who he apparently knew from his mysterious past, and the guy’s cute 12-year-old niece Jessie (Bodhi Rae Breathnach). Yet, while these early scenes walked a slower and more nuanced path than most of Statham’s body of work, it was actually kind of fascinating to see the British action star in a much different mode than we normally get.

In fact, when his old friend dies suddenly and violently and Jessie is injured in the attack, Michael Mason (although his name is not revealed until later in the film) takes in the young girl to live at the lighthouse with him and his dog, so that he can protect her. As a man who has little social interaction in his life, and particularly with children, it is a slightly awkward relationship but eventually becomes a strong bond between the two outcasts who have no one else left to care for in their lives. Jason Statham acting as a stoic but slightly sappy father figure? Yes, this is definitely some fresh territory for the actor.

Of course, once the connection is made, the real world starts to invade, and Michael’s past catches up with him. And here, it turns out that Shelter is a pretty typical Jason Statham film after all.

It turns out that the Scottish recluse was formerly a British MI-6 super-assassin (because who wants Statham to be just a normal assassin?). And when he has to journey into a nearby town to get some medical supplies for Jessie, he is identified by a sinister and controversial British super-computer (because, again, who needs a regular computer?) and suddenly battalions of spies are on his trail. Some want to arrest him. Some sketchier types want to kill him. And either way, Jessie will be collateral damage.

Mason is being tracked with a huge surveillance system which seems to have nearly unfettered access to all of the world’s cameras, cell phones and computers. The system was the brainchild of Manafort (Bill Nighy), Mason’s former MI-6 mentor who trained Mason to become an assassin, and who has never quite forgiven his old colleague for disappearing after having some conscientious objections to the missions he was being given.

Manafort has been removed from his role as the head of the MI-6 due to public outcry about the system (called L.E.N.A.), but he still enjoys complete control of the system on the downlow from his country manor. In the meantime, his old job has been taken by Roberta (Naomi Ackie), a much more reasonable and law-abiding executive who wants to bring Mason in safely just to find out why he has been presumed dead for a decade but has now come back to life and has apparently easily mowed through a whole bunch of her agents.

All that Mason wants to do is to get Jessie to safety, to make sure that she does not have to live looking over her shoulder like he has for the past decade.

The later parts of Shelter have some terrific action sequences, and it moves confidently and intriguingly through its slightly formula plot. And yet, while much of this is amusing and Statham is always good at this kind of stuff, I found myself sort of missing the quieter, more introspective pleasures of the first half-hour or so.

In this shift, Shelter goes from being something unique and heartfelt to something much more expected – not bad, certainly (although there are a few HUGE plot holes), but nothing we have not seen before.

Jay S. Jacobs

Copyright ©2026 PopEntertainment.com. All rights reserved. Posted: January 30, 2026.