“THE GRAY MAN” My rating: C (Netflix)
122 minutes | MPAA: PG-13
“The Gray Man” is so generic its makers could have forgone a title and opted instead for a universal product code.
It would be fitting for a movie whose hero is known only as Six.
The latest from directing siblings Anthony and Joe Russo (Marvel’s “Avengers” franchise) is an international spy thriller that aspires to “Bourne”/”Mission: Impossible”-level intensity but ends up looking like a wannabe.
Apparently mediocrity doesn’t come cheap. “The Gray Man” is allegedly the most expensive original film yet made by Netflix. Maybe they should have spent some of the pyrotechnic budget on a script.
In the first scene a prison inmate (Ryan Gosling) is recruited by CIA operative Fitzroy (Billy Bob Thornton), who offers to train him as a super secret agency assassin. He will become part of the shadowy Sierra program…in fact, we will know him only as Sierra Six.
Fifteen years later Six is in Bangkok on assignment. He’s been given an agency handler, Miranda (Ana de Armas) and instructions to attend a big New Year’s bash and eliminate a fellow who is peddling CIA secrets to the highest bidder.
Thing is, he discovers that the target is one of his fellow Sierra assassins.
The MacGuffin here is a memory stick crammed with evidence of wrongdoing by an agency bigwig (“Bridgerton’s” Regé-Jean Page), who sends the smarmy/ruthless Hansen (Chris Evans) to retrieve it. Hansen’s plan is to get to Six by kidnapping the now-retired Fitzroy and his 15-year-old niece (Julia Butters) — the only two people on earth with whom Six has any sort of relationship.
Well, the story takes us all over Asia and Europe. Inevitably Hansen’s minions catch up with Six, who always slips away — but not without numerous casualties among the local cops and citizenry.
The action scenes come with preplanned regularity and are busy without really making much of an impression…perhaps because the filmmakers were aiming for a PG-13 rating and couldn’t get really lowdown and dirty.
Gosling — admittedly one of our best actors — really doesn’t have a character to play here. Six is pretty much a blank page.
Faring much better is Evans, who is a shamelessly gleeful villain. With a tight haircut and pencil mustache he looks like the leading man in a ’30s porn short. All that’s missing are the black socks and garters. It may be ham, but it’s the most flavorful thing on screen.
Thornton and de Armas don’t have to do much emoting, and reliable performers like Alfre Woodard and Shea Whigham barely make an impression in brief supporting roles.
Technically the film is OK, and it practically serves as a primer for the use of drone footage…the camera is always zooming through the air, bobbing along the sidewalks and floating over and under structures.
In retrospect “The Gray Man” is a natural for a streaming service…it isn’t good enough to warrant the price of a ticket at the cineplex.
| Robert W. Butler
Butler's Cinema Scene 