Netflix And Chill: Back In Action (2025)

A Netflix action comedy that stars Jamie Foxx and Cameron Diaz, the latter coaxed back out of retirement for it, Back In Action is the kind of glossy entertainment that seems designed to upset cinephiles while entertaining many who just want an easy option to start watching on a Saturday night. While it is silly, and very slick, it's also quite a bit better than the trailer would have you think, thanks to some fun casting and enjoyable running gags.

Foxx and Diaz play Matt and Emily, a couple of talented spies who end up in a relationship. Their latest mission goes spectacularly awry just after Emily tells Matt that she is pregnant. They decide to get out of the spying game, knowing that both could be assumed dead anyway, and start over for the sake of a calm and normal family life. Fifteen years later, that seems to be happening. They have two children, Alice (McKenna Roberts) and Leo (Rylan Jackson), and no worries, aside from how their kids view them. Alice is in a bit of a rebellious teen phase. Leo enjoys his videogames and just embracing his nerdiness. Then there's an incident, and Matt and Emily end up being shown around the internet, which brings trouble to their doorstep. 

There are certain things that you can expect from this type of fare nowadays. It's very easy to spot who the villain is. There will always be someone shown in a bad light who has something in their history that puts a different spin on things. At least one big stunt sequence will make use of technology that can make it seem as if our main stars are actually in the thick of the action (I miss the days when you could point out the huge differences between actors and the stunt performers who would take over for the more dangerous moments). Oh, and everything set up in the opening sequence will be brought back into the plot for the third act.

Considering that standard checklist, Seth Gordon and Brendan O'Brien do a decent job on this screenplay. Gordon is also the director, another role he handles well, and this is a huge step up from his last feature, Baywatch (not counting the TV movie he did back in 2018, Dan The Weatherman). It's often generally amusing, if rarely outright hilarious, and the action beats are surprisingly well-done and satisfying, if a bit prone to repeating one particular tag-team move that the main characters enjoy utilising.

Foxx and Diaz have a great rapport together, and they feel equally suited to the spy action as they do to the moments of being fretting parents. They're so good together that it almost makes you forget the fact that, once again, they can never share an onscreen kiss (because this is mainstream movie entertainment, and the USA would still be shocked to see a loving relationship that has a black man and a white woman kissing one another - sad, but true). Roberts and Jackson both do well as the children who end up majorly surprised by the skills of their parents, although the latter has a ridiculous sub-plot that makes no sense, unfairly positions him as being superior to his sister in one important way, and ultimately goes nowhere. Kyle Chandler is someone I enjoy seeing in movies, and he's fine here as the "handler" named Chuck, Andrew Scott is a British agent who is in pursuit of our leads, but also has a bit of an obsession with Diaz's character, and there are a few scenes stolen by Glenn Close and Jamie Demetriou. I'm going to mention Demetriou again because he's the person who provides most of the biggest laughs in the movie.

There are some decent tunes throughout the soundtrack, as well as a suitable score from Christopher Lennertz, and the mix of action and humour remains consistently distracting enough to help you avoid picking at any plot holes, including a huge misunderstanding of just what the Thames Barrier is used for. I had a lot of fun with this while it was on. I'm unlikely to ever rewatch it, but at least it meets that bar set for undemanding Saturday night entertainment featuring stars being stars.

7/10

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Bonus Review: Bad Neighbours (2014)

Bad Neighbours (or just Neighbors, as it was originally titled in America) is one of those all-too-common cinema releases, a comedy that packs all of the best bits into the trailer. And, as is also all-too-common, it's all the more frustrating because it had the potential to be so much better.

Seth Rogen and Rose Byrne play Mac and Kelly Radner, a pair of adults who are trying to hang on to their youth and spontaneity. Viewers know this from the very first scene, which shows the couple trying to have some fun, spicy sex while the blissfully ignorant gaze of their baby daughter proves to be too off-putting. Perhaps the two will just have to accept that their adults now, with all of the responsibilities that entails. In fact, they have to act like real adults when the house next door to them is turned into a fraternity house (led by Zac Efron, as Teddy, and Dave Franco, as Pete). Mac and Kelly initially try to be cool, and even join the youngsters at their first big party, but it's not long until they realise that they have to do whatever it takes to ensure that the parties don't carry on. Teddy and Pete, of course, will do whatever it takes to keep the music loud and the alcohol flowing, and so begins a battle of wills.

Director Nicholas Stoller makes Bad Neighbours very much a party movie. There are loud tunes, neon-infused moments of drunken dizziness, and scenes that focus on general shenanigans. "Isn't this fun?" it seems to say. But those moments jar when the tone shifts, when it becomes clear that it's not as fun as it looks, when it's all about people partying or fighting because they don't know what else to do to reassure themselves of their position in life.

The blame lies squarely with writers Andrew J. Cohen and Brendan O'Brien, who just don't seem to be able to navigate the territory that they themselves laid out. Being unsure about how to mix the laughs with the darker moments wouldn't be so bad if the laughs were funny enough, but they're not. Instead, we get a lot of typical Rogen lines from Rogen, and lots of juvenile gags about penises. I like Rogen, but his character in this movie really needed to be more removed from his usual persona, and it isn't.

When it comes to his performance, Rogen is fine. If you like Rogen (which I do). Rose Byrne is also fine, although she's not treated as well by the script. Ike Barinholtz and Carla Gallo create some laughs as their friends, a couple now separated from one another, which makes for some obvious friction when they have to be in the same space. Dave Franco, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, Halston Sage, and Craig Roberts also do just fine in their range of roles; a well-endowed frat member, the girlfriend of Teddy, and a poor, bullied lad nicknamed Assjuice. The worst person onscreen here is Zac Efron, which shows how badly his character is written.

I like Zac Efron, I really do. In fact, if it was anyone else in the role that he has in this movie then the whole film would rate even lower. He manages to improve things slightly thanks to his charisma and, well, sheer force of will. But this role may be the worst that he's ever been handed in his career, so far. He's the antagonist, but he's also given too little depth too late in the proceedings as the writers try to layer the whole film with some meaning that isn't required. This is a film in which the funniest moments include the misappropriation of airbags. Okay, comedies can be layered with drama, but when things are shoehorned in as clumsily as they are here . . . . . . . . it just doesn't work out.

I wanted to enjoy this movie. I'm often a sucker when it comes to any cinema experience. Despite my years of experience, and disappointment, I still watch a well-edited trailer and think "yes, can't wait to see that". And, as many people know, I am easily pleased. It would have only taken one BIG laugh, or a better balancing act between the comedy and the slightly darker undercurrent, and I would have at least thought of this as a worthwhile way to pass some time. Sadly, that wasn't the case.

4/10

http://www.amazon.com/Neighbors-Blu-ray-DVD-DIGITAL-UltraViolet/dp/B00K89VBV0/ref=sr_1_2?s=movies-tv&ie=UTF8&qid=1401224051&sr=1-2&keywords=neighbors