In this film, super spy Orson Fortune (Jason Statham) must track down and stop the sale of a deadly new weapons technology wielded by billionaire arms broker Greg Simmonds (Hugh Grant). Reluctantly teamed with some of the world's best operatives Sarah (Aubrey Plaza), Nathan (Cary Elwes), JJ Davies (Bugzy Malone), Fortune and his crew recruit Hollywood's biggest movie star Danny Francesco (Josh Hartnett) to help them on their globe-trotting undercover mission to save the world.
Others to round out the cast are Eddie Marsan as Knighton, Peter Ferdinando as Mike, Nicholas Facey as John, Lourdes Faberes as Emilia, Ian Bartholomew as Bakker and Sam Douglas as Saul.
This was directed with grit along with an amazing amount of humor by veteran Guy Ritchie ("Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrells" '98, "Snatch" 2000, "Swept Away" '02, "Revolver" '05, "Suspect" (TV movie) '07, "RocknRolla" '08, "Sherlock Holmes" '09, "Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows" '11, "The Man from U.N.C.L.E." '15, "King Arthur: Legend of the Sword" '17, "Aladdin" '19, "The Gentlemen" '19, "Wrath of Man" '21) plus shorts, videos and music videos. Because of the distinction of Ritcie's directing style, one could actually recognize a Ritchie film after viewing it for about ten minutes not realizing it is one of his films. He films are created with such grit, quick and slick editing with polished cinematography. He definitely knows how to encourage his actors to emit the emotions that convince the audience that these characters mean business. I love to watch his films simply for the artfulness of them. If you like his brand of directing, his "The Covenant" is completed for a 2023 release. In fact, I've already seen a trailer of it starring Jake Gyllenhaal, and it looks intense. This film was delineated well by writers Guy Richie, Ivan Akinson and Marn Davies. Ritchie clearly has the lion's share of the experience here considering the other two writers have worked with him before. Atkinson and Davies apparently are a writing team, but are collaborators with Ritchie as well. Since these writers are so connected, it's no wonder that the script simply jumped off the screen. The premise wasn't as appealing as, say "The Gentlemen", but still held your attention for the almost two hour running time. I truly believe that bringing grit, action combined with humor to these films that Ritchie has been involved with, this film included, is a stroke of genius. It clearly makes an otherwise hackneyed script come to life.
Certainly if you're a Ritchie fan, you'll love this since it is golden Ritchie, but even if you're not, the cast including Grant, Statham, Plaza and Hartnett make this an entertaining film that we can escape into, and isn't this why we go see films?
Out of 4 Stars: 3.5 Rated: R 113mins.
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