Streaming Review

Red Notice review – Netflix’s megabudget caper is the year’s most forgettable film

Dwayne Johnson, Gal Gadot and Ryan Reynolds sleepwalk through a lazy adventure that never justifies its hefty $200 million price tag

Maybe it’s because of the much-touted $200 million price tag that Red Notice carries (the single most expensive film ever produced by Netflix), but the first thing you notice about this dishwater-dull heist caper is how cheap it looks. The GDP of a small nation might have been spent on this thing, though – starry lead trio aside – very little of that money seems to have made it to the screen. Throw in endless green-screen locations, weightless action with obvious stunt doubles, and tons of downright ugly design work, not to mention a snarkily generic script, and the result is one of the most instantly forgettable films of the year.

Presumably earning the lion’s share of that titanic budget are Ryan Reynolds, Dwayne Johnson, and Gal Gadot, who form an antagonistic trifecta all on the hunt for bejewelled eggs that formerly belonged to Cleopatra, worth roughly $300 million (and equal to one and a half Red Notices). Johnson plays FBI analyst John Hartley, while Reynolds and Gadot are rival thieves, him the notorious Nolan Booth and her the mysterious Bishop. After Hartley thwarts Booth’s first heist in Rome, the Bishop manages to get her hands on the egg, framing Hartley for the theft and managing to get him thrown in a Russian prison alongside Booth, forcing the pair to work together to find the eggs and clear Hartley’s name.

It’s the first of many plot points that are just hand-waved by writer-director Rawson Marshall Thurber, never believably explaining how anything is actually happening. Escapes are effortless, impossible geographical problems are solved off-screen, and all the characters (heroes and villains) aims their guns like they’re ten vodkas deep. Stakes are also non-existent from the off, so there are never any real thrills or triumphs. This is a film with the boring motions of a sub-sub-par Indiana Jones adventure.

Johnson and Reynolds are each pretty much genres unto themselves at this point, and your tolerance for Red Notice as a whole will depend on how much you enjoy their separate but semi-compatible schticks, as the pair really are on autopilot. They’ve both been much more fun as leads in the past than they are here (Reynolds looks particularly bored), and while Gadot is having more fun, she actually doesn’t get a whole lot of screen time, save for the incoherent, sequel-baiting final 20 minutes.

The most frustrating thing about Red Notice is that it didn’t even have to be all that good to be enjoyable. A mega-budget globe-trotting heist adventure not based on an existing IP should be a slam dunk by default, but Thurber and his cast can’t even muster up the basic fundamentals of an entertaining time at the movies. From leads with barely any chemistry to awful and repetitive set-pieces, it’s constantly tripping up over its own inadequacies, rushed and bloated at the same time. It’s too bland to be truly hateable, but it's also too bad to even remotely enjoy. Let’s just hope the inevitable sequels remember they're meant to be fun.

Red Notice is now streaming on Netflix.

Where to watch

More Reviews...

The Innocent review – 60s-inspired heist movie with an existential twist

In his fourth feature film, writer-director Louis Garrel explores with wit and tenderness the risk and worth of second chances

Baato review – Nepal’s past and future collide in an immersive, fraught documentary

A mountain trek intertwines with a road-building project, granting incisive, if underpowered, insight into a much underseen world

The Beanie Bubble review – a grim new low for the “corporate biopic” genre

With none of the saving graces of Tetris, Air, or Barbie, this ambition-free look at the Beanie Baby craze is pure mediocrity

Everybody Loves Jeanne review – thoroughly modern fable of grief, romantic confusion, and climate anxiety

Celine Deveaux's French-Portuguese debut can be too quirky for its own good, but a fantastically written lead character keeps it afloat

Features

Repertory Rundown: What to Watch in London This Week, From Little Women to Sergio Leone

From classics to cult favourites, our team highlight some of the best one-off screenings and re-releases showing this week in the capital

Repertory Rundown: What to Watch in London This Week, From Coppola to Cross of Iron

From classics to cult favourites, our team highlight some of the best one-off screenings and re-releases showing this week in the capital

20 Best Films of 2023 (So Far)

With the year at the halfway point, our writers choose their favourite films, from daring documentaries to box office bombs

Repertory Rundown: What to Watch in London This Week, From Mistress America to The Man Who Wasn’t There

From classics to cult favourites, our team highlight some of the best one-off screenings and re-releases showing this week in the capital