Argylle (2024)

Score: 1.5 / 5

A bumbling disappointment, Argylle released earlier this year as Matthew Vaughn's latest tongue-in-cheek, action-packed mess of a genre mashup. Shifting slightly in tone from his Kingsman franchise -- though we learn eventually that this is intended to be part of the same mythos -- this film follows a modern author eager to churn out the final installment of her beloved spy book series but suffers writer's block. Seemingly shifting perspective between the fictional world she has created and a real-life (and really life-threatening) espionage campaign around her, the author comes to learn awful truths about herself, her family, her livelihood, and the man she might possibly love. And we're along for the bizarre ride.

Vaughn's style is not for everyone, and even if you choose to get on his wavelength, it's not always a pleasant experience. Feverishly paced and obnoxiously buttressed by cartoonish CGI, his action sequences -- the bread and butter of his directorial efforts -- dazzle with eye-popping excess even as they clearly defy logic. Argylle seems to enjoy the unbelievability of its own action, flagrantly drawing attention to itself during the most incredible moments. Some of this you may have seen in trailers: remember the cat bouncing up off the tarp-wrapped boat to scream into the camera?

As usual, the ensemble cast is delightfully assembled and does its job well, led by Bryce Dallas Howard as author Elly Conway and a particularly excellent Sam Rockwell as Aidan Wilde, a real spy. Henry Cavill pops in occasionally as the imagined title character, though his hideous hair saps him of his usual charm. The fictional characters (including John Cena and Ariana DeBose) play as intentionally flat stock tropes, which works well enough, especially when the editing puts us in Elly's eyeballs and reality and her vision flicker back and forth. Add Catherine O'Hara as Elly's worrisome and somewhat condescending mother -- whose feedback only fuels Elly's block and whose (SPOILER ALERT) Marlene Dietrich-esque turn had me sputtering in joy -- and Bryan Cranston as the sinister head of an undercover agency determined to find and stop Elly from publishing (as her books oddly accurately predict their missions) and the whole thing should have been a lot of fun. But then you remember how many other stars were involved, including Richard E. Grant and Samuel L. Jackson, and the squandered promises come crashing back to the fore.

Aggressively plotted beyond the last inch of its life, the film uses archetypal devices stolen from everything from Mission: Impossible to The Lost City in its efforts to entertain. And it all feels like an exhausting, if not exhaustive, effort indeed. Satire and spoofery are sometimes admirable goals, especially when the state of the art calls for comic reflection and metafictional humor. But spy films are hardly in a place, culturally, to be dissected and repurposed right now, making this enterprise bizarrely forced, artificial in concept as much as in execution. Vaughn's penchant for cheap needle drops is on its most bombastic display here, and while they periodically elicited a guffaw from me, they were rarely appreciated because they weren't earned. Except regarding the obvious high prices paid for certain tunes.

Incomprehensible plotting results in convenient and unlikely twists, revelations, and resolutions that baffled more than enlightened me. And the more flashbacks and expositional monologues piled into the screenplay to make it make more sense, the farther from entertaining the whole thing gets. Its contrivances push it into formulaic romantic beats, draining the leads from their initially interesting characterizations. By the climax, a thoroughly overcooked exercise in banality shot in slow motion with some of the most invasive and unwelcome CGI Skittle-colored smoke I've ever seen, I was ready to abandon the whole thing, and frankly, I wish I had. The crushing disappointment of what could -- and should -- have been a delightfully camp speculation on the future of spy cinema ruined any memory of cutesy gags and funny potentialities that came before.

The Suicide Squad (2021)

 Score: 3.5 / 5

There will be much said of this movie in comparison with David Ayer's Suicide Squad, which I quite enjoy and which has become cool to hate. There will be much said of this movie as an adult version of James Gunn's family-friendly outings with Guardians of the Galaxy and its sequel. But I think this movie shares the most thematic and aesthetic qualities with Deadpool and especially Deadpool 2. Some will find that more entertaining, some more exhausting; I find it both, and while not necessarily fresh, it's certainly an interesting addition to the growing DC Universe. Gleefully violent, unapologetically irreverent, and absurdly grotesque, The Suicide Squad squirms into your consciousness and doesn't say "please love me, fans" so much as "I'm having fun; are you?"

In stark contrast to the opening of the prior film -- and yes, Gunn's movie is a sequel rather than a remake, although it has strong reboot tendencies -- The Suicide Squad spends almost no time introducing its characters before dropping them into action. The team, including Rick Flag (Joel Kinnaman), Harley Quinn (Margot Robbie), and Boomerang (Jai Courtney) from the first one, is rounded up by Amanda Waller (Viola Davis) for another mission. In the briefest of montages, Waller reminds the team that "Task Force X" comprises metahuman criminals with explosive chips in their skulls; if they desert the team, disobey orders, or fail, she has the power to kill them. And, given what they are often up against, their chances for survival are slim anyway. Success may allow them a chance at a decreased sentence. Unfortunately, Davis is given even less screen time in this movie, which infuriated me to no end, but at least she's still in the franchise.

Their mission: infiltrate Jotunheim, a fortress on the South American island called Corto Maltese, and destroy all traces of the mysterious "Project Starfish." The government of Corto Maltese was recently overthrown, and the anti-American regime wants whatever is in the former Nazi prison. Once the Suicide Squad lands on the beach, however, they are instantly slaughtered except for Flag and Quinn, who barely escape alive. Immediately, we learn that Waller had intended one team as a sacrifice; the other team makes landfall on another beach without incident. Waller might be a bad bitch, but so is Gunn, and this is the kind of structural playfulness that allows for subversive and morbid humor as well as narrative intrigue. We're all tired of superhero movies, generally, so we need these kinds of storytelling devices to mix things up.

Gunn has proven himself adept at handling large ensembles as both writer and director, and this is no exception. The "new" team consists of Bloodsport (Idris Elba), Peacemaker (John Cena), Polka-Dot Man (David Dastmalchian), Ratcatcher 2 (Daniela Melchior), and my personal favorite, King Shark (Sylvester Stallone), and each gets fair treatment from what could have been a bloated, unwieldy screenplay. It's a mismatched group (one that opens the doorway to similar theming that Guardians espouses), filled with undesirables and underdogs who could be heroes if given the chance. Well, maybe. Or they might just want to die. Once Flag and Quinn join with them, this movie really gets rollicking, and Gunn seems most comfortable in the chaos of conflict, redirecting focus between characters, allowing lots of vibrant, profanity-laced dialogue to bounce off the big stars and their characters' big personalities. They split up briefly, to simultaneously infiltrate Jotunheim and the new regime leader's private quarters, but playful on-screen and in-world text guides us through the setting.

While the blood-soaked action and hilarious vulgarity indicate Gunn's enthusiasm at fulfilling his hard-R ticket to ride -- and indeed, it is a wonder to behold -- this viewer found it increasingly tiresome. I felt similarly about Deadpool, where eventually pushing buttons for the sake of pushing buttons detracts from my enjoyment of boundary-pushing. Unlike in Birds of Prey, which it seems people keep forgetting about, this movie has very little emotional depth; the closest we get to it is Ratcatcher 2 fondly remembering the lessons from her father (Taika Waititi in a bizarre cameo) about their precious rats. By the climax of the film, when we learn "Project Starfish" is a Lovecraftian alien monster named Starro that uses mini-me facehuggers to turn civilians into drones (I know, it's really weird, guys), I was annoyed that everything was big CGI as buildings collapsed and scores of people died and the team came together in a big fight. On one hand, what else is a superhero movie going to do? On the other, can't a superhero movie do anything else?