Is Jeremy Renner Really a Movie Star?

by Kolby Solinsky

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Yea, that title is a little anti-presumptuous. He already is a movie star, right? No, but, like… legit. Is Jeremy Renner an action star? Is he a dramatic tour de force, or were The Hurt Locker and The Town just aberrations of a very, very good year?

Is he more SWAT, or more The Avengers?

(*Is it really a bad sign that he was possibly the only weak link in The Avengers, or was that due to a script and his lackluster character. Who is Hawkeye, anyway? Can anyone who doesn’t live in a basement answer that?)

(**Yes, I too live in a basement.)

According to Forbes, Jeremy Renner is the next great action star. The Bourne Supremacy, they say, could make him that invincible stunt man stalwart that we haven’t seen since the mid-to-late 1990′s, when Bruce Willis, Sylvester Stallone, Arnold, and John Travolta (yes, even him) formed a Big 4 more dominant than the only reliable shortstops of that era.

Is Renner really destined for that, though? “Action star” is a title that many possible “next great” ones have shook up in recent years. Ryan Gosling, Colin Farrell, or Leo? They all could have been, but they chose not to, instead opting for better, intense, dramatic roles.

Of course, the newest trend has been for “action movies that are actually good.” Drive last year, or In Bruges in 2008.

(***And, really, was Matt Damon even an action star? Even the original Bourne wasn’t the original Bourne.)

The Expendables made a boat load of money, but that was more of a fustercluck of comedy and good times than anything Oscar worthy (obviously). The Expendables was a parody of itself.

(****Jason Statham didn’t make it, either. Too British, and too bald.)

No, Jeremy Renner is not the next great action star, probably because he won’t choose to be. If he is, then Alfonso Soriano really was the latest great Yankee.