A review of all old knives

Chris Pine’s career as Jack Ryan ended abruptly after one movie, but like George Lazenby and James Bond, that might make him the perfect man to play other creative heroes. at All the old knivesPine enters the movie with perfect hair, a ridiculously modern scarf and a deadpan look, Derek Zoolander’s look more so than Tom Clancy’s tough, quick-thinking analyst. But director Janos Metz-Pederson wastes a little time on Blue Steel in the espionage world before tapping into the less superficial qualities that Payne brings to Ryan and James Kirk, even if his role here feels like an imitator of his best performance.

Most films set in the “present” use the expected release date as the time frame. This is explicitly set in 2020, the year of its production, but it also includes recurring memories of 2012, which are referenced by pictures of Barack Obama on the walls of CIA offices. In 2012, the “reality” of the hijacking of a major Austrian airliner ended with the deaths of everyone on board, and eight years later the case was reopened. Henry Pelham Payne is hired by director Vic Wallinger (Lawrence Fishburne) to find out why he didn’t solve it the first time around.

While there is a possibility of a mole, the stronger possibility is that Henry’s former classmate and lover Celia (Thandwe Newton), or at least someone you know, was the culprit. In a perfect dinner meeting at the Golden Hour in Carmel, a conversation between the two, along with a series of flashbacks, begins to piece together what really happened. Henry puts a hitman outside waiting to take Celia out if he doesn’t like what he hears, but Celia, despite her retirement, is smart enough to prepare with her own support.

It seems fitting that Amazon initially became a retail giant based on book sales, and as a studio now churns out the cinematic equivalent of airport thrillers. A decade or more ago, a quote from an Olen Steinhauser novel All the old knives They may have easily competed with the big-screen versions of bestselling John Grisham and Scott Turow, but audiences no longer want to pay more than $20 per ticket for them — at least not in theaters. Streaming services stepped in to fill the void, along with companies like Potboiler Productions, whose name could not be more apt to develop films like this.

In addition to their intellectual wit, Payne and Newton engage in a bedroom showdown as well, a welcome response to social media grumbling about the lack of love scenes in contemporary films. Then again, the movie is mostly set in 2020, so it’s probably included more as a work of nostalgia. However, from celebrity shots to Jonathan Pryce’s American accent, All the old knives It’s compelling moment by moment, but then viewers may have some lingering questions about what the characters hope to achieve, or why they are involved at all. Payne and Newton capture the public’s attention, but as CIA analysts both seem to miss details that will be important to their jobs – although, to be fair, it’s easy to get distracted by the mutual attraction.

For better or worse, the film describes both Islamic terrorists and (indirectly) Vladimir Putin as the world’s most evil, and highlights the problem that arises when other world powers try to take sides. however, All the old knives It offers enough clearinghouse for notorious bad guys (here comes the Chechens!) that it’s likely to feel more like a waste of time than a calculated referendum on geopolitics. Critics tend to fret that it is often taken for granted by the CIA, but this movie is unlikely to provoke a deeper cultural debate than what it sees on Friday night after Mom and Dad put the kids to bed and poured a few glasses of wine. Not to mention that it was told clearly from the CIA’s point of view, no matter which character the viewer stands with at the end.

While it’s unlikely that Pine would have found himself a new franchise here, the actor’s ability to show courage and then undermine it with weakness makes him the perfect choice for projects other than Jack Ryan like this one. Maybe he can do it the next day consumables.