Review of 'Red Notice'

At the beginning of the film we are told a “Red Notice” is the highest level warrant for criminals. Top FBI profiler John Hartley (Dwayne Johnson) works with Interpol agent Urvashi Das (Arya) in Rome to stop an attempt by master thief Nolan Booth (Ryan Reynolds) from stealing one of “Cleopatra's Eggs” on display in the Museo Nazionale di Castel Sant'Angelo. After escaping to his home in Bali, a few days later Booth is visited by Hartley who has Booth arrested and the egg seized by Interpol. While taking Booth away the egg is stolen by Sarah Black (Gal Gadot) AKA “The Bishop” resulting in both Booth and Hartley sent to a remote prison. Booth tells Hartley that he knows where the third egg, which has been missing for many years, is held and the two agree to team up to recover the final egg with Hartley hoping to capture the elusive Bishop. Sounds simple enough…?

A bunch of silly action from Netflix with the ever entertaining Ryan Reynolds teaming up with the Rock to provide two hours of fun. It is all very cliched with every heist movie plot point thrown into the story but, honestly, we can put that aside and just enjoy the awkward chemistry between the two leads. The dialogue is not as witty as other similar films but it is still quite amusing and with Gal Gadot throwing her acting heft around as well as her incredible athleticism (honed no doubt from her role as Wonder Woman) ramps up the action quite considerably. She demands our attention every minute she is on the screen while the Rock and Reynolds clown around in the background. There are many gimmicky double-cross and double-double-crosses that end up being quite tiresome by the end with the audience simply waiting for the next plot twist to pull the rug out from underneath them - Once or twice is fine but it appears that there are many, many such switches that it starts to get irritating though, interestingly, it never seems to overcomplicate the story.

The action looks great and is, of course, often quite preposterous but that is part of the fun here. This will not be winning any Oscars but it is an amusing film though I wish they had sharpened up the dialogue and stopped the multiple, tedious plot reversals.

Rating: “Nearly perfect, but not quite”

Review Date: 2021-11-21

Directed by: Rawson Marshall Thurber

Studio: Netflix

Year: 2021

Length: 118 minutes

Genre: Action/Adventure

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt7991608/