Red Notice
Might contain spoilers.
Disappointing. The Rock is stripped of his hair, the source of his strength his charisma and
comedic chops by the role of a generic, uninteresting, humorless hunk of meat. Gal Gadot is
permitted only to be sly, vicious, and cruel while substituting a lack of clothing for charm. Ryan
Reynolds is still funny, but he
overcompensates for the the others, unfortunately relying heavily on swearing and innuendo in the
process. Interestingly, the beginning of the film has him silent for a significant length of time,
which I thought indicated he wouldn’t be relying on his persona this time around, but he soon put
that theory to rest.
The plot is nonsensical, as you’d expect. Urvashi Das only exists to chase the central trio while accomplishing nothing. While the violence is gratuitous and the torture has no business being in the story, the moments without action are mind-numbing. I found it nearly impossible to pay attention in the last third.
I will say that the middle section is the strongest. Sotto Voce[1] coming back to life again and again is hilarious. Ryan Reynolds arguing with The Rock over movies had me doubled over in laughter. The Ed Sheeran cameo close to the end is very amusing.
Film School Rejects’s incisive review astutely summarizes the film:
While technically an “original IP,” the movie is actually anything but. Sure, the story isn’t tied to an existing franchise, but there’s a case to be made that all three leads are walking, talking franchises themselves. Each of them can play their respective roles here in their sleep — Gadot may actually be doing so — and it’s those human IPs that the film is built on. The rest is irrelevant meaning any plot element could easily be swapped out for another, and the end result would be the same.
- I don’t know why Chris Diamantopoulos affects such a distinct voice for the role.↩