Jessica Alba Worked With the 'Mechanic' Filmmakers to Fix Her 'One-Dimensional' Character

Senior Editor

Jessica Alba was not feeling the character Gina Thorne when she was first offered the part in the new Jason Statham action sequel Mechanic Resurrection. “She was pretty one-dimensional,” Alba told Yahoo Movies at the film’s recent Los Angeles press day, adding that the role “was pretty kind of typical of this kind of movie.”

So the Sin City actress said she worked with the film’s director, writers, and producers in “developing a character that felt she was a match” for Statham’s hardcore hitman, Arthur Bishop. “If the love story was going to drive the plot forward, you needed to have someone that Bishop would respect. Not just some kind of vapid girl that you don’t even remember her name.”

Years after faking his own death at the end of 2011’s The Mechanic, Bishop is living the sweet life in Rio de Janeiro when he’s forced out of retirement by a vengeful old acquaintance (Sam Hazeldine). He soon ends up on the beaches of Thailand where he meets and falls for Alba’s Gina Thorne, who does indeed possess some qualities you could see Bishop appreciating: she retired from the military to follow humanitarian pursuits.

“The fact that she’s a social worker but has a military background gives her complexity that can rise to Bishop’s,” Alba explained.

Gina eventually gets taken hostage and falls into the damsel-in-distress mold that, like Alba noted, is “pretty typical” of the genre. But she also got to flex her fighting chops opposite one of the biggest action stars in the world in Statham.

“I definitely felt a little nervous the first time I did a fight sequence in front of him,” Alba said. “As a woman in entertainment, you are put in situations where you can kind of mold characters to feel right for women. Someone that guys and girls want to see.”

Mechanic Resurrection opens Aug. 26. Watch the trailer: