It’s amusing to think that once upon a time, Guy Ritchie was criticised for typecasting himself as a director who solely made “mockney” gangster flick that traded heavily on stylish editing and snappy banter. It’s amusing because over the last few years, the filmmaker has since revamped his career to solely making slick heist movies that trade heavily on stylish editing and snappy banter – so I suppose it’s all good. In Ritchie’s defence, at least he’s switched genres while delivering all the time jumps, montages and smugly confident voice overs that fans have come to know quite well feom his work. If The Ministry Of Ungentlemanly Warfare gave the cocky heist a war backdrop, and The Fountain Of Youth went all National Treasure on us, In The Grey plants itself in the tense realms of the globetrotting action/thriller. However, strip off all the bells and whistles and a rather plain question emerges – isn’t Ritchie now just making the same film over and over again?
Rachel Wild is one of those high powered, cutthroat lawyers who specialises in recovering debts for absurdly rich and powerful clients. One such client is asset management firm, Spencer Goldstein, and when it comes to leveraging such huge amounts of money from potential ruthless holdouts, she’s been known to employ some rather ruthless tactics herself thanks to her trusted, clandestine operatives, Sid and Bronco.
When Rachel’s mentor is assassinated while trying to settle the $1 billion debt racked up by unpredictable, evil businessman, Manny Salazar, she takes the exceedingly dangerous contract from Spencer Goldstein executive Bobby Sheen in order to both get some payback and clear a hefty payday. Drawing up a plan of attack into order to punch a hole through a wall of lawyer bullshit and get herself in the same room as Salazar, she tasks the incredibly slick duo of Sid and Bronco to assemble a team and target various holdings that Salazar has to boot him where he feels it the most – his wallet.
Through a campaign of of such underhanded tactics as bribery, sabotage and subterfuge (all subtly handled, of course), Salazar first sees his construction projects grind to a halt due to various issues, and then finds that both his private jet has been grounded and his yacht has been impounded, costing him inordinate amounts of money by the day.
While Salazar’s lawyer, William Horowitz, sweats his body weight trying to untangle the mess Rachel has made, Sid and Bronco head to the billionaire’s Spanish island in order to prepare numerous escape routes if Wild’s visit ultimately goes bad. But even with the meticulous antics of her cronies all laid out in the form of booby traps, response times and a sizable amount of hidden explosives, can this group of savvy individuals manage to collect the debt without catching matching bullet holes?
I’m getting increasingly confused with the way Ritchie’s career has been going of late. Obviously, that earlier point which suggested that the filmmaker is making the exact same film within different genres is starting to get more than a little alarming. But beyond that, I’m getting increasingly curious as to why the director’s works seem to continuously keep going straight to streaming in his native UK. Maybe it had something to do with a staggered release date that was supposed to see it released early 2025 but constantly saw it postponed – but it eventually seemed to score it the same streaming fate as Ritchie’s last few films, which seems strange considering the amount of weight his name carries in his homeland. However, while you may be wondering why I’d choose to take up a sizable portion of this review openly wondering about the various reasonings behind its curious release patten, it’s because musing in this turns out to be ultimately far more intriguing and original than anything that happens in the actual film.
That’s not to say that In The Grey isn’t a fast paced and slick action/thriller, but anyone who is wise to Ritche’s various tricks and quirks will find that the film doesn’t actually have anything original to say. In fact, judging purely by the two characters played by Henry Cavill and Eiza Gonzalez, there’s a case to be made that this film could even pass as an extremely loose sequel to The Minitry Of Ungentlemanly Warfare, if you were to claim that Wild and Sid were ancestors of the no-nonsence people that they played in that movie. Cavill is the unfeasibly charming, unshakable, action lead who remains stubbornly unruffled by absolutely everything, while Gonzalez is the similarly driven lawyer who seeks an audience with lethal men of power, and both deliver Ritche’s dialogue with the usual clipped efficiency that the director’s films require.
However, despite the rather strenuous action that ensures that the booms go big and the bad guys are plentiful, no one here is actually required to stretch themselves in any way whatsoever. In fact, Jake Gyllenhaal’s Bronco is so laid back throughout the film, his heavy lidded performance suggests that the actor is literally on the verge of doing this in his sleep, despite firing lines like “It’s harder to deal with a mouse in the house than a gorilla in the villa.” like it’s a thing that normal people say all the time. They’re backed up by a gang that blend into the background so much, I didn’t even notice when one of them bought the farm when shit goes down, and despite the fact that Rosamund Pike and Fisher Stevens are having fun as slimy business types, the real star of the film once again seems to be the brazen, rapid fire style that Ritchie infuses his films with. Yes, it makes everyone involved seem effortlessly cool, but also makes them about as forgettable as that guy at work whose name is always on the tip of your tongue. You know the one. Whatshisface.
To reiterate, In The Grey moves at such a fair old clip and batters you with such an onslaught of data, that it’s tough to actually be bored, but despite a fairly exciting final third and some deft action beats, nothing about the film actually stays with you other than it’s a marked improvement on the aggressively vapid Fountain Of Youth. I mean, when’s the last time you watched a film where Jake Gyllenhaal did absolutely nothing of interest in an action movie for an entire ninety minutes? Or where practical explosions the size of a skyscraper fail to make a lasting impact? Ritchie seems to have honed his skill of shooting action to a fine edge and his eye for a zippy heist training montage remains undiminished – but I’ll be damned that if at any point during this handsome, but rather empty, film if I actually gave a shit about any of the players.
While Ritchie still can make us fall in love with cheeky chappie gangsters on the small screen, he seems to have lost all ability to make us care for his features beyond admiring the scale of his latest heist. It’s big, it’s bolshy and its predictably brazen, but it’s also fairly fitting that the film is called In The Grey, because that’s exactly where the film mostly sits in my rapidly evaporating memory.
🌟🌟🌟