reviewed by Julian Lytle
grade: C+
Alright, what we have here is that Guy Ritchie seemed to be envious of Tom Cruise and called up his main star Jason Statham and decided to do a Mission Impossible-like spy romp with a touch of that Ritchie humor. Here Statham plays a contractor spy named Orson Fortune, who has a taste for very expensive wines, and he’s brought in to find a stolen device that can endanger the world. His operator, Nathan (Cary Elwes), gathers him a team made up of Aubrey Plaza as Sarah Fidel, the techie, who is basically playing the sarcasm and dry wit people know her for, and Bugzy Malone as J.J. Davis, who is like a younger version of Statham’s character.
While in this movie, Statham’s Fortune doesn’t take damage—like Steven Segal’s movie in the mid-90s. Most of the fun comes from Hugh Grant as arms dealer Greg Simmonds who hams it up as a wealthy guy in love with celebrity. The other entertaining performance is from Josh Hartnett, who plays movie star Danny Francesco; it feels like a mash-up of a ton of action stars from the history of Hollywood with a ting of a Keanu Reeves accent.
The film is pretty paint by numbers, but it is fun as it’s done mostly all tongue in cheek with the right amount of winking at the audience the whole time. While not a stand-out in the spy genre, it is a more fun play with the genre in that it does take itself seriously enough in the story so that the comedic parts work to make the characters feel more cool than silly. Also, the film looks good on the big screen as it shows all these globe-trotting locales with good, even if standard-looking, cinematography.
Originally posted on the Geek Girl Riot podcast on idobi.com
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