Black Bag (2025)

Here's another film from the long-retired director Steven Soderbergh. Coming along so soon after Presence, which was also written by the writer of this, David Koepp, it would be interesting to consider just how many movies we would get from him if he hadn't decided to duck out of the industry years ago and spend time resting on his laurels. 

George Woodhouse and Kathryn St. Jean (Michael Fassbender and Cate Blanchett, respectively) are a married couple who are both in the spy business. Their marriage is enviably solid, but things may get tricky when it looks as if Kathryn has been up to some treachery. In order to get to the bottom of things, George ropes in a number of friends (played by Tom Burke, Marisa Abela, Regé-Jean Page, and Naomie Harris) to help him. He'll either ask them for favours or interrogate them with a polygraph attached, but he'll do whatever is necessary to untangle the whole messy situation.

One or two moments aside, and even those could be tweaked, Black Bag is the kind of film that you could easily envision as a stage play. The plotting is smart, yet also keeps things slightly confusing in a way that is nicely in line with the murky world of spycraft that we're dropped in the middle of. Keeping track of everything should show you how it all works out plausibly, but it's one that I think may well require at least one or two rewatches to fully unpick.

Koepp does well to deliver a mix of characters who feel enjoyably different from one another while also feeling capable of doing what their job entails. He also ensures that the dialogue feels authentic for everything that our protagonists are discussing. I'm not saying that it IS, but it feels that way to a layman onlooker like myself.

Soderbergh loves a challenge, which is what I assume drew him to both this and Presence (that one being a haunted house movie from the POV of the presence, this one being a spy thriller with the emphasis on conversations and a look at the mindset of those who take on such work), and it's a good job that he is often up to the task of meeting those challenges. He has times when he misses, and I am one of those people who really disliked Presence, but his hit rate is pretty impressive, and there's usually always at least something of interest in even his weakest features.

Fassbender and Blanchett are both as excellent as you'd expect, and there's a nice little role for Pierce Brosnan that allows him to lift the film momentarily with a perfect mix of menace and that typical Brosnan charm, but it's interesting to see how well the supporting cast do to hold their own alongside the two more established stars. Burke, someone who doesn't always impress me, is brilliant, providing some of the funniest moments of the film in a way that doesn't move everything too far away from the main tone of the whole piece, Abela projects the image of someone very capable, but perhaps trying too hard to disguise her own intelligence, and both Page and Harris sink their teeth into roles that could have easily been all-too-forgettable.

Low-key throughout, but no less thrilling for it, this is top-tier cloak and dagger stuff. It might not be the very best example of this kind of thing, and I suspect one or two loose plot points that I may or may not be satisfied with on a rewatch, but there are times when it comes very close. 

8/10

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Venom: Let There Be Carnage (2021)

Sometimes a movie comes along that really highlights the divide between audiences and out-of-touch movie critics. Venom was one of those movies. It was a mess, particularly during a CGI-filled third act, but it was also a whole lot of fun. Venom: Let There Be Carnage is a sequel that stays very comfortably in that messy fun zone. It's also just as good as the first film, and benefits from not having to set up the central Venom/Eddie Brock dynamic, positing them from the very first scene as a standard "odd couple", good friends who also irritate the hell out of one another.

After talking to the notorious murderer Cletus Kasady (Woody Harrelson), Eddie Brock (Tom Hardy) finds his star back on the rise. He might be moving from loser to less-dismissable loser. The fact that his story actually came from information detected by Venom means that his body-sharing symbiote personality is, to use the technical term, ready to go in a big huff. Venom rarely gets to eat the food that he likes best, he doesn't get credit for his work, and he's fed up of the way Eddie is resolutely not making the most of his life. He might even leave Eddie's body and look out for some other host. That timing wouldn't be very good, because Cletus Kasady has his own symbiote about to reveal itself, a red beast named Carnage. 

Andy Serkis is the director for this instalment, taking over from Ruben Fleischer, and Kelly Marcel is now the lone writer, although Hardy is credited with helping shape the direction of the series. Everyone involved maintains a nice consistency, developing the humour that was quickly set in place in the first film while also increasing the threat level. Not only is Carnage a stronger and more dangerous foe, he has a potential partner who goes by the nickname Shriek (Naomie Harris). Shriek has a power that you might be able to guess from that name, and that may well prove a vital advantage while fighting Venom.

Everyone here knows exactly what they are a part of, a silly film that can bob and weave around moments of seriousness. Hardy is a real hoot, playing an exasperated “partner” who has to admit that he should try harder in a relationship he unwittingly got dragged into. Harrelson plays his deranged killer with a good balance of sadism and wit, and just a hint of a tragic past informing his motivation. Stephen Graham is a cop wondering how Eddie Brock gets his information, and both Harris and Michelle Williams (returning) get to do enough to feel like more than just token females dragged into the plot. Okay, Williams is put in peril at least once, but she is also responsible for forcing her ex, Eddie, to acknowledge his flaws and acknowledge the feelings of others.

The CGI is less murky than it was in the first film, although the finale is still essentially one computerised blob fighting another, the fun factor is ramped up further, and there are some very enjoyable cameos scattered here and there (the most notable being a stinger at the very end). It may retread familiar territory, and some may still bemoan the fact that Venom has had his sharp corners smoothed down, as it were, but this is a film that I can easily recommend to fans of the first. In fact, watch one immediately after the other and you have one near-perfect Venom epic. Without the need to actually go . . . EPIC!

8/10

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Prime Time: Street Kings (2008)

Street Kings is a gritty cop thriller directed by David Ayer AND based on a story by James Ellroy so, basically, if you go into it expecting any of the main characters to be unselfishly trying to do good in a bad world then you've never experienced any previous stories from either man. But, just in case there was any doubt, the whole thing helps to let viewers know what they are in for when the main character gets beaten up by some criminals and has his car stolen, which we then discover is all part of a plan to allow him to find where the crooks are holed up, with young female kidnap victims being kept there until they can be moved/sold on, and he then gets to barge in, shooting to kill. It's a good deed, in the grand scheme of things, but it's also symptomatic of the way this character acts. He'd also had a couple of drinks beforehand. He wasn't interested in any due process. He is someone being watched with interest by those who investigate such individuals in the force.

All of this is just a taster to the rest of the film, of course, which follows Detective Tom Ludlow (Keanu Reeves) as he tries to keep doing the job the way he prefers to do it while keeping himself protected from the prying eyes of those who want him stopped. He's helped in this regard by his captain (Forest Whitaker). One of the people wanting him stopped is his ex-partner, Detective Terrence Washington (Terry Crews), and things start to look even stickier for Ludlow when he and Washington are caught in a seemingly random shoot-out. Washington is killed, and Ludlow wants to find those who did it. But those who know Ludlow's behaviour think it would be best for all concerned if the case was dropped and the shooters left to get themselves arrested or killed on some other occasion.

Although there are plenty of beats here that are very familiar to fans of Ayer's work, Street Kings does turn into something slightly different once it gets beyond the opening third act. It's still not a million miles away from anything else the director has done, but the more interesting developments stop it from feeling like nothing more than a tired rehash. You can feel the Ellroy heart beating through most of the runtime, once that opening act is out of the way, and the screenplay put together by Ellroy, Kurt Wimmer, and Jamie Moss is solid in terms of the plotting, pacing, and character development. That's not to say that it's always believable, not at all, but there's enough done to distract you from/let you forgive the less believable moments.

Reeves is very good in the lead role. He's not on top form, it's always a bit harder to believe him as someone with such a murky moral code, but he does well enough. Whitaker gives one of his standard turns, and is good enough, and Crews does enough to show himself as a viable threat to his ex-partner before the shooting takes him out of the film. The rest of the cast is full of great performers, although they are not all used as well as they could be. Chris Evans is the highlight, playing the detective in charge of the shooting investigation who ends up allowing Reeves to help him, and you also get Hugh Laurie with an American accent again, and Jay Mohr, John Corbett, and Amaury Nolasco playing the main colleagues who accept that getting the job done often means breaking some rules. Naomie Harris and Martha Higareda try their best, despite being given the usual short shrift that women tend to get in Ayer movies, and there are good little moments for Cedric The Entertainer, Common, and The Game.

Far from essential viewing, this remains a film I would highly recommend to those who like this particular subgenre. The various elements are well put together, it feels like something a bit different for Reeves, and the ending is surprisingly satisfying when everything eventually pays off.

7/10

You can buy the movie here.
Americans can buy it here.

Rampage (2018)

Say what you like about Dwayne Johnson, the man can do silly action spectacle with an admirably straight face (well, an arched eyebrow or pec twitch notwithstanding). He knows that he's not going to be called upon to do anything too serious, not yet anyway, and he most often stays comfortably in his wheelhouse. That might sound like I'm being a bit condescending and snooty but I'm really not. I enjoy seeing Johnson in most movies, he even tries to do his best in dross like Baywatch, but he excels at action fare, and he can sell some of the most ridiculous cinematic moments in recent years without viewers throwing their hands up in disgust and giving up on the movie. Who else could believably grab a speeding missile and turn it back towards enemies that were trying to kill him?

Rampage, loosely based on the videogame that I even managed to enjoy on my old, rubber-keyed, Spectrum 48K, is silly action spectacle. There's the main plot itself, a large albino gorilla is turned into a HUGE albino gorilla, with some anger issues, and there are also another couple of big creatures heading towards Chicago to cause massive amounts of destruction as they go on their . . . rampage. There are also the plot details, silliness wrapped in tech-speak to try and make it all sound plausible. You may think the conversations about genetic manipulation and pathogens are laughable, because they are, but they do the minimum required to kickstart the plot and explain events, as long as you don't think about what has been said as you move on to the next scene of entertaining destruction. And, if you need even more silliness, there's a moment that sees Johnson trying to use a damaged helicopter to surf/hover his way down a collapsing tower.

Johnson is very much at ease amidst all of the preposterous set-pieces, emanating his usual charisma and souped-up muscle power. He spends a lot of the runtime alongside Naomie Harris, who does well to avoid being overshadowed while she delivers most of the exposition in between the thrills, and the two human stars are overshadowed, but not literally, by some impressive CGI beasties. Jeffrey Dean Morgan gets to be amusingly charming and ambiguous as the man who is hoping to clean up the debris and capture the creatures, and Malin Akerman and Jake Lacy are the humans who need to weigh up their self-interests alongside the carnage.

Director Brad Peyton previously delivered this kind of Johnson-led spectacle with San Andreas, so we know that he CAN give audiences what they want (well, he kept me happy enough), but there's something here that's a bit lacking. I still found enough to enjoy, I was entertained enough by the scale of the destruction, but maybe having to incorporate enough little nods to the original videogame was enough to detract from a more simplistic slice of fun. Yes, I realise that I just accused Rampage of not being simplistic enough. It took four writers to make this. Four. To write a script that turns that classic videogame into a mainstream blockbuster.

Still, it's better than Battleship.

6/10

The blu can be bought here.
Americans can buy it here.