Here is a moderate action spy thriller directed by James Hawes, who previously made the Nicholas Winton drama One Life. It is conceived in the robustly muscular style of Bourne and Mission: Impossible, and features Rami Malek as nerdy CIA intelligence analyst Charles Heller, whose wife is murdered by terrorists in London. Enraged at a lack of progress in the case and suspecting a cover-up, he blackmails his immediate superiors into training him to be an assassin (by threatening to reveal their black ops), so he can hunt his wife’s killers and whack them. His exasperated teacher is Colonel Henderson, played by Laurence Fishburne. It’s based on an 80s bestseller by Robert Littell, filmed once before with John Savage in the lead.

There’s a bit of entertainment value: a big scene at the swimming-pool-in-the-sky bridging two skyscrapers, which the film imagines to be in Madrid rather than its actual location in London, plus a wacky moment in which Charles has to get his smartphone out and watch a YouTube tutorial on how to pick a lock. But there is a fundamental problem concerning how ruthless Charles is supposed to be in killing his wife’s murderers in cold blood – which would compromise his relatable nice-guy status – and the final confrontation with the homicidal mastermind involves a very muddled exchange of views. Charles wishes to maintain his moral superiority, and his antagonist does not challenge him on the subject of the CIA’s own culpability over the years.

As for Malek’s performance, his line readings and screen presence are very distinctive, but I have to say the moments when he has to present anguished emotion to the camera do not quite work, and feel eccentric. Holt McCallany gives an amusingly vigorous performance as the cynical agency honcho Moore.

• The Amateur is released on 10 April in Australia and 11 April in the UK and US.