lord_orsum

I have some good news and some bad news.

The good news is that Idris Elba and John Cena have plenty of charm and buddy chemistry. The action scenes are well shot and the hand-to-hand combat is well choreographed.

The bad news is that the plot makes little to no sense. The idea that NATO keeps files on all of its member's dirty secrets is nonsense, and the inexplicable ability of the bad guy to show up wherever and with an endless supply of special ops type goons is absurd. The finale when he arrives at the NATO summit (in the actual meeting room) with a small army by surprise is a complete "huh!" moment.

Overall, it's a by-the-numbers buddy action flick, with good action and terrible writing.

Here is the story of a house. The conceit (or gimmick, if you will) of this film is that the camera never moves; the entire film is shot from a static angle, with comic-book style frame-within-frame transitions between different periods (and inhabitants) of the house. Only at the very end does the camera move.

The story covers multiple inhabitants, but primarily the life of Tom Hanks' character, Richard. It has to be acknowledged that the de-aging CGI is nothing short of miraculous.

The film covers the highs and lows of these varied lives, the successes, the regrets, the abandoned dreams. If there is a message here, it is to find the joy in every day, in everything, and most of all, in the people you love. The housewife dancing while vacuuming sums this up perfectly; it could be a chore, but it is embraced as an act of pure joy.

I gave this 8/10 purely for the bravado of original film-making. Zemeckis dared to try something different, and that is something we don't often see these days.

Dave Bautista is a "good guy" hitman (he only accepts contracts on bad people), who is diagnosed with an incurable brain condition. He takes out a contract on himself, but (oh no!) he was misdiagnosed. Cue lots of silly fight scenes between Bautista and various cartoonish hitmen (and hitwomen).

The story does not overstay its welcome, and the action is suitably over the top, with plenty of blood and limbs flying everywhere. The director knows not to take the film too seriously, and that is a good thing.

Bautista has plenty of "big guy charm" nd plays very well against Ben Kingsley, who also knows exactly what kind of project this is.

Accept this for the fun nonsense that it is.