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Rawson Marshall Thurber ’s “Red Notice” should work on paper. It’s got a charismatic cast sent globe-hopping to beautiful places on a treasure hunt straight out of an “Indiana Jones” movie. How could it go wrong? Well, for starters, Thurber and everyone involved forgot a little thing called personality. Rarely have I seen a movie that feels more processed by a machine, a product for a content algorithm instead of anything approaching artistic intent or even an honest desire to entertain. And while there have been quality blockbusters produced by the Hollywood machine for generations (I miss those days), it feels like we’re increasingly reaching the point where they are so calculated and programmed that the human element is completely drained from them, making them as disposable as a fast food cheeseburger. Worst of all, that “content” approach is pulling the life from stars who have shown so much of it in the past. When the poster for “Red Notice” was released, most people lamented its Photoshopped, bland nature. They didn’t realize how honestly it captured the movie.

Thurber, the director of “ Central Intelligence ” and “ Skyscraper ” (two movies I enjoyed enough on their own terms, for the record), reunites with his muse, Dwayne Johnson , who plays the FBI’s top profiler John Hartley. The film opens with an awkwardly inserted info dump about three coveted eggs that were once the property of Cleopatra. Only two have been discovered, making the missing golden egg into a Holy Grail for treasure hunters, including one of the world’s most notorious criminals Nolan Booth ( Ryan Reynolds ). In the film’s relatively effective opening sequence, Hartley catches Booth trying to steal one of the eggs, inadvertently tying the two for the rest of the film into a classic buddy comedy dynamic—the muscle guy and the fast talker. They battle the authorities, a few bad guys, and another criminal mastermind nicknamed The Bishop ( Gal Gadot ) as they bounce around the world, trying to obtain all three eggs and sell them to the highest bidder.

Films like “ Raiders of the Lost Ark ” and “ National Treasure ” were clear inspirations on “Red Notice” but to say this movies lacks the identity of great action/adventure movies would be an understatement. Thurber’s direction seems to have been simply to put Reynolds, Johnson, and Gadot on camera and allow their screen presence and familiar techniques to carry the story, and one can literally see the weight of that on their shoulders. Johnson has never been this wooden, unable to find the hero or everyman in a non-character. He needs to figure out what's next because he seems to be tired of parts like this one and he's too charismatic to convey tired for the next chapter of his career. Reynolds makes out a little better, but you can almost see him growing weary of his attempts at witty schtick as more of his attempts at humor thud than usual. It feels like everyone thought casting would be all it took to make “Red Notice” charming and then forgot to give their actors charming things to actually do. Oh, there’s a lot of running and a lot of banter, but it starts to blend into cinematic paste.

People have lamented the growing sensation that Netflix increasingly makes product that’s designed to be watched with a phone in your hand, and I’m not sure I’ve ever felt this more strongly than while watching “Red Notice.” Made for $200 million, none of that fortune was spent on anything that retains a human touch—it’s the iPhone app of action movies. Look up and see a beautiful person in a beautiful place running or shooting something—go back to your phone. While there are some truly goofy and yet somehow predictable twists, there’s almost no real story here, certainly not a memorable one. And the settings, while often gorgeous, somehow lack personality too. Even the title sounds like something grabbed out of an Action Movie Screenwriter program.

So much money, so much charm, so much movie, and yet it adds up to so very little. “Red Notice” is as disposable a movie as you’ll see this year, something that most Netflix subscribers will have trouble remembering exists weeks later. It sets up a potential franchise in its final scenes (because of course it does)—let’s hope everyone involved forgets about that too.

In theaters tonight, November 4 th . On Netflix on November 12 th .

Brian Tallerico

Brian Tallerico is the Managing Editor of RogerEbert.com, and also covers television, film, Blu-ray, and video games. He is also a writer for Vulture, The Playlist, The New York Times, and GQ, and the President of the Chicago Film Critics Association.

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Film credits.

Red Notice (2021)

Rated PG-13 for violence and action, some sexual references, and strong language.

116 minutes

Dwayne Johnson as John Hartley

Ryan Reynolds as Nolan Booth

Gal Gadot as Sarah Black

Ritu Arya as Inspector Urvashi Das

Chris Diamantopoulos as Sotto Voce

• Rawson Marshall Thurber
• Michael L. Sale
• Julian Clarke

Cinematographer

• Markus Förderer
• Steve Jablonsky

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Red Notice - Review

An okay action-adventure that copies better films..

Red Notice is in theaters for a limited release on Nov. 5 with digital streaming on Netflix Nov. 12, 2021.

On paper, Red Notice reads like a no-brainer crowd-pleaser. Rawson Marshall Thurber ( Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story ) directs the trifecta of attractive actors — Dwayne Johnson, Ryan Reynolds, and Gal Gadot — in a slick, action-adventure romp. It’s got everything you need for the proverbial “good soup” of moviemaking, but unfortunately, Red Notice just takes sequences from far better films and mushes them all together into some bad goulash. 

It starts well enough with an engaging opening that sets up the MacGuffins of the film, which are the three ornate eggs that Mark Antony supposedly gifted to Cleopatra on their wedding day. Two were recovered, with one in a museum in Rome and the other in the private collection of a wealthy arms dealer, while the third exists only in rumor. The Rome-based egg is targeted for thievery on the black market, which spurs FBI special profiler and art specialist John Hartley (Johnson) and Interpol Inspector Das (Ritu Arya) to confirm that it’s still secure. It is not, because famed art thief Nolan Booth (Reynolds) has already absconded with the priceless piece, creating the first of many, many chases involving the two men trying to outmaneuver one another physically, mentally, or, in Reynolds’ case, with an arsenal of “dad joke”-level quips.

The other player in this quest is Gadot’s Sarah Black, a slinky art thief who considers herself the greatest in the world, and makes it her life’s work to be just one step ahead of both Hartley and Booth as she’s pursuing the eggs for a buyer willing to pay $300 million for their collection and delivery. 

In the first act, Thurber teases with a breezy and well-choreographed museum escape that he’s going to subvert the big, loud set pieces expected in these kinds of films with something different, and then he doesn’t deliver. As the players jump from Rome to Bali to London to Valencia and finally, Argentina, playing find the eggs, the less each scenario feels original or fresh. Several action sequences are framed like first-person video games with the camera inside cars during chases, or handheld during fistfights to put us inside the action, but it’s far from innovative or exhilarating. It just feels like gimmicky video game cut scenes that aren’t anything new to the choreography, framing, or even fun of the fights.  

There’s also the issue of the audience ever buying that Reynolds is going to hold his own longer than a full-blown punch or two with Johnson in a fist fight. Then Gadot is added to the melee, easily holding her own, or just plain besting both of them. While I appreciate that Gadot’s Black at least gets to take her heels off for major fights, none of these people are superheroes, which means the only one brawling with any cred is Johnson, so there’s a lot of suspension of disbelief required. 

And that’s carried through to Reynolds’ Booth, who is a test to the nerves with his constant, terrible running commentary of comebacks and snarkery about everythin g. Yes, it’s Reynolds’ signature schtick, but in Red Notice, he operates like an obnoxious talking doll with a broken pull string. In yet another suspension of disbelief, it’s unbelievable that neither Gadot or Johnson’s characters wouldn’t gag him with a sock by the second act, especially when Booth gets weirdly emotional with Hartley. Who needs bro bonding in a heist, relic, caper?

By the second and third act, every set piece feels derivative from another movie.

Thurber makes a lot of other odd choices in the film, like not letting Chris Diamantopoulos go full weird with his short-man-syndrome arms dealer, Sotto Voce (yes, that’s the character’s name.) Instead, he’s allowed to rasp his lines like he’s in dire need of a lozenge, but never ends up taking the space an intentional bad guy should have in a movie like this. In fact, there’s no real antagonist of note to hang the stakes of the film on at all, and that’s because Thurber is more interested in maintaining the moral liquidity of all the characters so you’re left guessing about their true intentions instead of feeling any sense of danger at any point. It’s just an endless race from museums to Russian prisons to bullfighting rings and jungles, which all blur together without giving anything time to breathe, as we wait for someone to double-cross someone because that’s all the whole movie keeps giving us.

Plus, by the second and third act, every set piece feels derivative from another movie. Ocean’s 11 , Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, National Treasure , The Mummy , and even Mr. and Mrs. Smith could all rightfully accuse Red Notice of stealing their scenes. What makes it even worse is the fact that this cast is up to doing something truly different. Gadot, when she appears, plays Black like she’s having a lot of fun. Reynolds is more than capable of not coming across like a human blooper reel, but that’s all he’s asked to do here. And Johnson does his best to bring a competent hotness to Hartley so he’s not just the muscle, which makes him the MVP here. But the dialogue and strange, forced bromance that Booth demands of Hartley, even if it’s a joke, is tiring and not as engaging as the filmmakers think it is.

Red Notice really needed a script with a much lighter touch all around. It should have been sexier and smarter, with less action, and more original storytelling. Instead, it’s a mindless diversion that’s blandly familiar, yet thinks it’s far cleverer than it really is. 

The Verdict

Red Notice starts with a lot of energetic potential but then devolves into a pastiche of other, better films, cribbing scenes that feel like they were lifted straight from a myriad of films from Indiana Jones to Dirty Rotten Scoundrels. Of the three mega-star leads, Dwayne Johnson acquits himself the best to committing to his FBI profiler as more of a brainy hero rather than just brawn, and it works. Reynolds exists as a quip machine who gets tiresome quick, while Gadot feels like she’s barely in it. While this may be positioned as a new franchise, there’s nothing here that sets up any urgency or excitement to go on more adventures with this trio.

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Watch Red Notice with a subscription on Netflix.

What to Know

Red Notice 's big budget and A-list cast add up to a slickly competent action comedy whose gaudy ingredients only make the middling results more disappointing.

Red Notice promises big stars trading quips on a fast-paced action adventure -- and delivers across the board.

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Rawson Marshall Thurber

Dwayne Johnson

John Hartley

Ryan Reynolds

Nolan Booth

Inspector Urvashi Das

Chris Diamantopoulos

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Dwayne johnson, ryan reynolds and gal gadot in netflix’s ‘red notice’: film review.

An FBI profiler is forced to mix it up with two rival art thieves on a globe-trotting hunt for ancient Egyptian treasure in Rawson Marshall Thurber’s action-adventure comedy thriller.

By David Rooney

David Rooney

Chief Film Critic

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You can’t argue with the muscular marquee value of headlining Dwayne Johnson , Ryan Reynolds and Gal Gadot in a slick, fast-paced action thriller laced with playful comedy, even if it’s an empty-calorie entertainment like Red Notice . Like many Netflix star vehicles, writer-director Rawson Marshall Thurber ’s busy crime caper has more glossy industrial sheen than unique personality. But it’s diverting enough to justify the sequel so clearly set up in its final scenes, even if it’s unlikely to linger in the minds of many viewers beyond the end credits. Mostly, the derivative adventure keeps you occupied checking off the many films from which it borrows.

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Some of those, like the Indiana Jones movies, are acknowledged with a cheeky wink — for instance when Reynolds’ Nolan Booth, played with his trademark obnoxious smartass attitude, descends into a vault crammed with priceless antiquities looted by Nazis and whistles a couple of bars of John Williams’ Raiders of the Lost Ark theme. There are less overt but no less redolent inspirations throughout Red Notice — to the Bourne, Bond and Mission: Impossible movies, the National Treasure franchise and the Sean Connery-Catherine Zeta-Jones romp Entrapment . Maybe even a touch of Mr. & Mrs. Smith .

Release date : Friday, Nov. 12 Cast : Dwayne Johnson, Ryan Reynolds, Gal Gadot, Ritu Arya, Chris Diamantopoulos, Ivan Mbakop Director-screenwriter : Rawson Marshall Thurber

The production flashes the names of international locations spanning five continents across the screen at regular intervals, but because of COVID-19 restrictions, it ended up being shot entirely in Atlanta. Production designer Andy Nicholson has done a creditable job re-creating famous sites like Rome’s Castel Sant’Angelo in the buoyant opening scenes, though elsewhere, attentive eyes will be quick to spot studio sets. A South American jungle, complete with a waterfall and lagoon, almost conjures thoughts of the Maria Montez camp classic Cobra Woman .

A mock TV history special sets up the backstory with the mystery surrounding three bejeweled eggs, each one more exquisite than the last, presented to Cleopatra by Mark Antony on their wedding day. The eggs were long believed to be a myth, until two of them turned up in 1907; one now sits in a Rome museum and the other with a private collector. But the whereabouts of the third remain unknown.

Following an anonymous tip that notorious art criminal Nolan Booth is planning to lift the egg displayed at Castel Sant’Angelo, FBI behavioral analysis unit profiler John Hartley (Johnson) intervenes before the thief can exit the museum, triggering an accelerated chase through the Roman monument and surrounding streets that also involves Interpol inspector Urvashi Das (Ritu Arya).

She seems less than thrilled with the unsolicited collaboration of Hartley, even more so when they both turn up to apprehend slippery Nolan and retrieve the treasure from his swanky pad in tropical Bali. When the egg again goes missing — with a fake being switched for the real thing — and a hefty cash transfer lands in Hartley’s account, Inspector Das presumes he’s in on the theft and adds him to her wanted list. The top-level international arrest warrant is called a “red notice,” hence the film’s generic title.

Through some fuzzy plotting that probably doesn’t stand up to close scrutiny, Hartley is forced to team up with Nolan to clear his name and track down the real mastermind pulling the strings from behind the scenes, another notorious art thief known as “The Bishop.” No prizes for guessing who plays that devious shadow figure. She seems to be one step ahead of her rivals at every turn in a plot that keeps deftly springing double-crosses, surprise twists and long cons through to the very end, when all three of Cleopatra’s eggs are finally within reach.

While Thurber’s script never quite shakes the feeling of déjà vu, it does deliver a steady stream of amusing one-liners, most of them given to Reynolds’ self-serving jokester. “You a top or a bottom?” Nolan asks from the bunk bed when Hartley finds himself sharing a Russian prison cell with the thief. Johnson, who worked with the writer-director previously on Central Intelligence and Skyscraper , does his usual affable deadpan with relaxed charm. He rolls his eyes every time he’s the butt of another one of Nolan’s wisecracks, in a begrudging rapport that inevitably morphs into bromance.

The film’s keenest pleasures come when Gadot is onscreen, clearly having a ball shrugging off all traces of heroic nobility to play a ruthless badass who makes everything look easy. The Bishop (we never learn her real name) is a supreme tactician with useful connections all over the world, who handles herself formidably whether in high-kicking heels, with firearms, or by grabbing whatever ancient weaponry is at hand.

There’s a fun, flirtatious buildup between her character and Johnson’s as they tango during a ritzy party at the Valencia mansion of a billionaire arms dealer named Sotto Voce (Chris Diamantopoulos), who owns the second egg. He keeps it in a high-security vault full of priceless artifacts, with entry requiring lots of cool gadgetry and smart subterfuge. The fight that ensues once the intruders are inside that confined space, like all the physical clashes, is expertly choreographed.

The biggest set pieces, in addition to the high-speed Castel Sant’Angelo sequence, include a Russian prison break that turns out to be on an icy mountaintop, and a chase through the labyrinthine tunnels of an abandoned South American copper mine, with Hartley, Nolan and The Bishop in a deluxe 1931 Mercedes and Inspector Das and her team in pursuit in a jeep. Despite the ample gunfire and even some low-level torture scenes, there’s no real bloodshed or death, making this a generally family-friendly crime jaunt.

Thurber pads out the character development by giving all three protagonists their respective daddy issues. But that half-baked psychology doesn’t do much to disguise the fact that they’re all playing minor variations on their familiar screen personas, right down to an amusing Vin Diesel gag that’s possibly a sly nod to The Rock’s old Fast and Furious feud . There’s nothing groundbreaking in Red Notice , but depending on your affection for the stars, you could do worse. You might even get a kick out of the weirdly gratuitous British pop star cameo.

Full credits

Distributor: Netflix Production companies: Seven Bucks, Flynn Picture Co., Bad Version Cast: Dwayne Johnson, Ryan Reynolds, Gal Gadot, Ritu Arya, Chris Diamantopoulos, Ivan Mbakop Director-screenwriter: Rawson Marshall Thurber Producers: Beau Flynn, Dwayne Johnson, Rawson Marshall Thurber, Hiram Garcia, Dany Garcia Executive producers: David B. Householter, Scott Sheldon Director of photography: Markus Förderer Production designer: Andy Nicholson Costume designer: Mary Vogt Music: Steve Jablonsky Editors: Mike Sale, Julian Clarke Visual effects supervisor: Richard Hoover Casting: Rachel Tenner

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‘Red Notice’ Review: Ryan Reynolds, Dwayne Johnson, and Gal Gadot Star in Netflix’s Breezy Mega-Budget Caper

David ehrlich.

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Historically speaking, “ Red Notice ” should be unwatchable. For starters, Netflix ’s previous fall blockbusters (e.g. “Bright,” “6 Underground”) have been very bad. Not just bad in the way that movies are bad, but bad in the way that war crimes are bad — they shouldn’t have been reviewed by critics so much as tried at the Hague. These are films so bad that Joe Rogan should have spent an episode of his podcast spreading batshit conspiracy theories about how they escaped from the Netflix content labs. These are films so bad that you half expect to see Forrest Gump stumbling through their crowd shots as part of his accidental journey through America’s defining crises.

But at least they were directed by people with strong artistic sensibilities. “Red Notice,” on the other hand, is the brainchild of Rawson Marshall Thurber , a once-promising comedy director (“DodgeBall,” “We’re the Millers”) who was more fun to resent for his what if Colin Jost and Henry Cavill went into that machine from “The Fly” together good looks than for his role in enabling Dwayne Johnson ‘s quixotic quest to simultaneously become the most charismatic and least interesting movie star of all time. Thurber may not be quite as complicit as “San Andreas” and “Rampage” auteur Brad Peyton, but “Central Intelligence” and “Skyscraper” are both summer blockbusters so bland they helped to deflate the entire tradition of such tentpoles. Whatever points they scored for “originality” were negated by their perverse determination to seem mass-produced.

That Thurber and Johnson’s latest collaboration is reportedly the most expensive movie Netflix has ever made would be reason enough to assume that “Red Notice” is just another high-concept spectacle in which the bravery of Johnson’s character is betrayed by the actor-producer’s life-threatening allergy to creative risk. Add Ryan Reynolds and Gal Gadot into the mix — two other A-list stars whose sense of range seems to end with their costumes — and you have such a perfect storm of modern Hollywood mediocrity that people might start hoarding toilet paper and canned goods before it reaches land.

Alas, you already know where this is going: Call it an early Hanukkah miracle (as one drop of inspiration somehow manages to power this movie for almost two full hours), but “Red Notice” is a lot of fun, if often in spite of itself. While in essence still the kind of flavorless slop that a peevish critic might have expected Netflix to produce from these ingredients, this globe-hopping tale of cops and robbers on the hunt for Nazi gold is glazed with enough panache, humor, and franchise-thirsty ambition to feel like it isn’t taking the audience for granted.

There’s precious little in “Red Notice” that people haven’t seen Johnson do before (with the possible exception of the part when his character name-checks 19th-century Scottish artist William Strang), but at least his latest attempt at a swashbuckling throwback is liberated from the sort of waterlogged mythology that sank Disney’s “Jungle Cruise.” Enjoyably cartoonish set pieces keep the movie light on its feet, a carousel of exotic locations make sure you never have to think about the MacGuffin, and Reynolds — in a rare display of discretion — only calls his co-star “baldilocks” once. In 2021, that counts as some kind of win.

At its best, “Red Notice” feels like a glam and glossy live-action riff on “Lupin the Third,” with a little “Uncharted” mixed in for good measure before the movie takes a late swerve into another genre altogether. Reynolds is Nolan Booth, the world’s greatest art thief and a general cad. Johnson is John Hartley, the boulder-sized FBI profiler who’s been tracking Booth around the world, and seems hellbent on stopping him from stealing all three of Cleopatra’s jewel-encrusted eggs (priceless treasures that an Egyptian billionaire hopes to give his daughter as a wedding present).

Gadot is the wild card between these two silly boys, playing the only person on the planet capable of beating Nolan at his own game; she’s known only as “The Bishop,” though it’s unclear why she chose that title, or what pieces the other characters might represent on her chess board. Unsurprisingly, the actress’ most important function in the movie is to wear slinky dresses for Reynolds and Johnson to drool on. The red number she wears to the villain’s “Eyes Wide Shut”-like masquerade party stands out for compelling a hyper-masculine Dwayne Johnson character to admit that sex exists and is something he might be interested in having one day. Needless to say, hearts will be stolen before everyone in this bizarre love triangle reveals their angle.

And it isn’t long before things go screwy and people begin to switch sides, as Inspector Urvashi Das (Ritu Arya) races to the conclusion that Hartley — her partner! — is actually behind the heist that unfolds during the opening sequence, a high-energy set piece that starts with one of the three Cleopatra eggs being nicked from a Rome museum in plain sight. Cut to: Hartley and Nolan bunking together in a black site prison that’s perched so high atop a snowy Russian peak that not even eagles would dare to break them free. The Bishop has one of the eggs, a Napoleonic arms dealer named Sotto Voce (Chris Diamantopoulos) has another, Nolan is the only person alive who knows where the third one might be, and the magnate willing to pay $300 million if someone brings him the ancient treasures by the night of his daughter’s nuptials won’t fork over a penny for anything short of a full set.

And so begins a wild goose chase that stretches from a Siberian gulag to a South American Nazi bunker and all points in between as friends become enemies, enemies become friends, everyone airs their daddy issues, and nobody actually gets hurt (including the various henchmen our heroes meet along the way). Nobody actually leaves Atlanta, either, as the pandemic cramped Thurber’s plans for an international shoot, and forced his team to fake a series of far-flung locations in a way that more closely reflects the Marvel approach to moviemaking than it does the old school adventures that “Red Notice” hopes to exhume.

Not unlike the hologram tech that Nolan uses to swipe priceless artifacts from museum showrooms, the illusion holds for just long enough to get the job done. That the Russian jail is such a ridiculous place helps to launder its non-reality, and Thurber grounds Hartley and Nolan’s big escape from it in bite-sized human details so that the more heightened beats to come feel like they stem from the same comic tone; the sight gag of a prison guard using a shirtless photo of Putin as his iPhone background helps butter you up to believe the huge stunt that follows a few minutes later, when Hartley turns a helicopter just in time for a rocket to pass through both of its open doors. Of course, that particular joke is an outlier in a politically and emotionally anodyne movie that keeps with Johnson’s soul-deadening refusal to spend his star capital on anything that might someday cost him a vote.

The first hour of “Red Notice” does such a fine job of threading the needle between hard-boiled action and comic absurdity that its ends justify their means and the film’s cast is free to lean on their respective brands as a crutch. Does it make sense that Nolan is a clumsy buffoon one minute, and the most gifted prop fighter since Jackie Chan the next? Absolutely not, but it’s fun to watch Reynolds use scaffolding to politely incapacitate some featured extras while Markus Förderer’s gravity-defying camera zooms around the well-choreographed chaos like a drunken mosquito. It’s also telling that Reynolds’ best moments are blocked, and not improvised; his quips are a bit sharper than usual (save for the occasional “dipdick” and other such dumbass retorts that sneak through just often enough to remind you to be grateful that it doesn’t happen more often), but his disaffected schtick is still mighty stale without a “Free Guy”-level concept to keep it fresh.

In fact, Thurber’s film is funniest when it functions as a featherlight commentary on its various screen personas. There’s a cutesy bit at the masquerade ball when Gadot pretends not to recognize all 23 square feet of Dwayne Johnson behind his eye mask, and that same in-on-the-joke energy flows through almost every minute of a breezy lark that offers a few pennies of fun on a $200 million budget… a budget that falls well short of whatever Thurber needed to sell the Atlanta of it all the whole way through, as the third act is such an embarrassing parade of TikTok-level green screen that it seems like the film was shot in sequence and we’re watching it run out of money in real time.

While the movie sometimes hides behind its own derivativeness in lieu of daring to play things straight — the references fly fast and furious long before a punchline is made at Vin Diesel’s expense — “Red Notice” never loses sight of the visual shorthand that comes with bonafide stardom, nor the simple joy of seeing very famous people make total fools of themselves for a laugh. Sometimes we even get to laugh along with them. Empty calories aren’t all created equal, and this is the first thing the Rock has cooked up in a long time that might actually leave you hungry for more.

“Red Notice” will open in select theaters on Friday, November 5. It will be available to stream on Netflix starting Friday, November 12.

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Netflix’s Red Notice is as bad as blockbuster movies can possibly get

The film’s star-studded franchise-starter is cheap and clumsy, but worse — it’s boring

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This review of Red Notice originally ran in conjunction with the film’s theatrical release date. It has been updated and republished for the movie’s Nov. 12 Netflix streaming debut.

Early in Netflix’s attempted heist blockbuster Red Notice , FBI agent Johnson Hartley ( Dwayne Johnson ) tracks wisecracking thief Nolan Booth ( Ryan Reynolds ) to the Museo Nazionale di Castel Sant’Angelo in Rome. Booth plans to swipe an 18-karat Egyptian egg, but the priceless artifact has already been stolen. Hartley proves it by pouring a can of Coke over the counterfeit egg on display. The lacquer of fake gold dissolves under the corrosive liquid, and the egg melts into rusted trash.

No scene in this lumbering action movie better exemplifies how hollow writer-director Rawson Marshall Thurber’s Netflix film is. Featuring a trio of supposed movie stars who lack the panache or charisma of true marquee headliners, Red Notice is another visually ghastly bid at building a franchise on the back of action sequences that commit a cardinal sin for blockbuster thrillers. The sequences here that are supposed to carry the excitement aren’t just oddly cheap and ugly, they’re breathtakingly boring.

Like the National Treasure or Indiana Jones movies, Red Notice is propelled by the mythology of ancient artifacts and the greed they attract. According to this movie’s lore, more than 2,000 years ago, Roman general Mark Antony gifted his love, the Egyptian queen Cleopatra, with three golden eggs. After their joint death by suicide, the three tokens were scattered. One settled in the Museo Nazionale. Another is with a private collector. The third has been lost for centuries. An Egyptian billionaire wants to reunite the eggs for his daughter’s wedding, and is willing to pay big money to bring them together. Hartley very nearly foils the plot, until he’s framed as a thief by a mysterious criminal named The Bishop ( Gal Gadot ). He needs to find the three eggs and arrest Booth and Bishop if he wants to clear his name.

While Red Notice is meant to provide origin stories for these characters, their backgrounds are lackluster. Hartley and Booth turn out to have similarly tragic childhoods, stemming from terrible dads. But their long-winded summaries of their lives are so banal, they don’t supply any emotional branches for the audience to latch on to. Nor are they funny. The unlikely pair wind up tethered by a common cause, but Tony Curtis and Sidney Poitier in The Defiant Ones they are not. As they confront the ruthless Bishop, who is maneuvering against them as a poorly rendered copy of Sharon Stone in Basic Instinct , their improbable partnership grates under a script filled with dreadful dialogue. (This is another film that uses the “We’re opposites, but we’re actually not all that different” trope.)

Thurber’s script cribs from a compendium of cinematic references to assemble the movie’s events. Everything about their meetings and interactions with Bishop, while avoiding a pursuing Interpol agent, Inspector Das (Ritu Arya), comes from a familiar visual language. A masquerade party finds Hartley and Bishop engaging in a tête-à-tête on the dance floor. Their bodies wrapped around each other, in the seductive motions of the tango, is meant to evoke the sensual power dynamics at the heart of True Lies . Between the Rock’s stiff muscular frame and Gadot’s stiffer face, it’s rendered as an asexual shadow of that film. Other references include The Third Man , Gladiator , Reservoir Dogs , Raiders of the Lost Ark , and so forth. Some of these odes are winking. Others are blasphemous inclusions in such a cinematically bankrupt film. Every reference only reminds savvy viewers what this movie isn’t.

On a craft level, nothing here has any spark. Cinematographer Markus Förderer ( Independence Day: Resurgence ) relies on widescreen, an aspect ratio that in theory befits a globetrotting heist flick. But Red Notice ’s wide canvas is composed of cheap paint: The constant use of CGI backdrops results in vulgar brown-tinted lighting. The locations — Rome, Russia, London, Egypt, etc — are indistinguishable from each other. The compositions are equally unimaginative, leading to perplexing camera angles and nauseating camera movements during fights. The widescreen format is a tease that never translates to a bigger punch of action.

With Deadpool star Ryan Reynolds in the fold, along with Thurber’s comedy background — he directed Dodgeball and We’re the Millers — Red Notice ’s comedic verve should be in the bag. But Reynolds falls into a familiar sarcastic persona, and Johnson and Gadot are poor partners for his improvisational antics. They just aren’t funny. Johnson can’t ping-pong Reynolds’ strained references to Instagram, iPhones, or deepfakes back to him. Gadot has zero comic timing. The height of Red Notice ’s comedy is Johnson being rammed by a CGI bull in the middle of a coliseum, only because, by that point, we side with the bull.

Neither the film, the script, nor the actors provide any reason to care about these characters or this plot. What does it matter if they attain all three eggs? The world isn’t on the verge of ending. No governments are being harmed. No one’s life is in danger. Instead, this film is merely an incoherent preamble, a jalopy star vehicle where quality is secondary to producing a franchise launching pad. The film eventually winds toward a legend involving Hitler’s art dealer, with a dreadfully shot car chase set underground, caked in hideous visual effects. The grand finale is so unlikely that the incomprehensible screenwriting logic necessary to sell it provides a coma-inducing whiplash.

Thurber wants to bank on the sex appeal of Red Notice ’s central trio, but putting such uninteresting actors at the center of the story is a huge turnoff. The film is meant to look and feel immense, but Steve Jablonsky’s cheap score and the film’s over-reliance on visual effects makes the entire project look oh-so-tiny. The recent Army of Thieves and Red Notice both raise the question of whether the executives greenlighting these movies at Netflix have any idea what makes for engaging tentpole cinema, or what it takes to craft stories that stick in viewers’ hearts so they return again and again, no matter what iteration a story takes. What Red Notice does prove is that the streamer is very good at spending lots of money on fool’s gold, only for the short-term shine to flake away when each new project finally goes on display.

Red Notice debuted in theatrical release on Nov. 5, and is now streaming on Netflix.

Red Notice Review - You've Seen It Before, But It's Still A Blast

The latest Netflix original movie has big star power for an action movie that feels real familiar.

By Mat Elfring on November 12, 2021 at 12:00AM PST

Action movies that are silly, fun, and rewatchable seem to be few and far between these days, but Red Notice somehow hits all the right beats for an action-adventure film. And frankly, it has no right to be this enjoyable. However, the reason because it hits all those right beats is because we've seen it all a million times. Red Notice is fun, but that's because it's incredibly derivative of movies with a unique voice.

Red Notice is National Treasure meets Indiana Jones meets a lot of True Lies. It plays to the viewer's sense of nostalgia and at times, feels like it was made by Netflix's algorithm to play to lovers of '80s and '90s action movies.

The film follows FBI agent John Hartley (Dwayne Johnson) who is after art thief Nolan Booth (Ryan Reynolds) as he attempts to steal a very decorative art piece. However, there's another waiting in the wings, Bishop (Gal Gadot)--the most-wanted art thief in the world. Booth and Hartley team up to get a hold of other pieces--the fanciest of giant eggs once owned by Cleopatra--before Bishop can.

The movie is overly-layered to the point where things just feel silly, you see "surprise" twists coming from a mile away, and you're so focused on what movies Red Notice is paying homage to that you start missing what's going on. Case in point, at one point, Hartley walks up to Bishop at a classy party, who is looking at some art, and says, "Beautiful... the sculpture, I mean"--this lead me to laugh out loud way too loudly, and was a line of dialogue I rewound no fewer than three times. This conversation leads to a dance between the two at said party. This isn't a "dance" as in a fight. It's a dance, much like the one shared between Arnold Schwarzenegger and Tia Carrere in True Lies, which also kicked off after some very cheesy dialogue. What was happening during that sequence of events is overshadowed entirely by the fact we're revisiting a really fun moment from a classic '90s action movie.

Every beat of the movie desperately wants you to remember other movies that did it better. That's quite the bummer to realize once the high of Red Notice has worn off. You've just watched the '80s and '90s action-adventure movies greatest hits album, and what was missing were those sweet transitional songs that tied everything together perfectly. Is this a bad thing? Not necessarily, as long as you realize that's what the movie is trying to hit and you're along for the ride. If you're on board, you'll be treated to action, comedy, and one of the weirdest characters in recent movie history.

Chris Diamantopoulos, primarily known as eccentric billionaire and wing door-enthusiast Russ Hannamen on Silicon Valley, plays Sotto Voce--an eccentric billionaire who collects pieces of high-valued art. Diamantopoulos's vocal choice for the character can only be described as "David Attenborough needs his inhaler." The light-British, breathy, posh accent is so bizarre and jarring, and then you notice the weird tattoos all over him, but he's also super-rich, and then all you want is a two-hour long spinoff to learn more about this cinematic weirdo. Alas, as soon as that thought pops into your head, Voce is no longer part of the story.

Red Notice takes you on a circus tour of unusual and cliche places where action sequences will take place, like underneath a stadium hosting a bullfight, or on a scaffolding in a museum, or climbing up a bridge that was destroyed by a rocket launcher. The film isn't bringing anything incredibly new to the table; however, it's a blast to watch it play out. Will that bridge the hero is running across get blown up by the guy holding the rocket launcher and will the hero have to climb up the remnants of said bridge? Duh. Do I want to see that? Of course.

The film really pushes star power. The poster is just Gadot, Johnson, and Reynolds looking very classy in fancy clothes--which tells you absolutely nothing about the plot. They all play various aspects of the same character--they're all very badass and cool but on different sides of the law. Johnson is an FBI agent, Reynolds is a quick-witted criminal with a heart of gold, and Gadot is a thief that's one step ahead of everyone else. Gadot is supposed to be the antagonist, but no matter who triumphs in the end, I found myself perfectly happy with whoever it was.

The characters feel that paper thin for most of the movie, like they were just popped into existence prior to the story beginning. At times, backstories for each character creep in a bit, but you feel more investment with action sequences and globe hopping more than anything else. And Gadot, Johnson, and Reynolds do a fine job in the movie with what they got--Reynolds fires off jokes left and right, Johnson is once again playing that stoic tank, and Gadot is tough and cool. That's all you really want from them.

Red Notice is what it is: a popcorn movie that will entertain the heck out of you and mainstream audiences will eat up. Sure, it's very derivative, predictable, and silly, but that's what we need. We need a break from reality to watch a plot that tries to be way more complicated than it should with a handful of twists, over and over again, that won't shock anyone. Red Notice is a middle of the road movie that is one of the most fun experiences I've had during the pandemic.

• Leave Blank
• It's the most fun I've had watching a movie all year
• Sotto Voce is a ridiculous character that needs a spinoff
• It makes me want to watch True Lies again
• By the end, all the characters feel like one note
• There's nothing new here
• It shouldn't make me want to revisit other movies

About the Author

Mat Elfring

• @ImMatElfring

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Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Red Notice’ on Netflix, a Pointless Junk-Food Action-Comedy Guaranteed to Waste Your Time

Where to stream:.

Dwayne Johnson's 'Red One' Reportedly Delayed By His "Chronically Late" Arrivals And Unprofessional Behavior: "It Was A F****** Disaster"

The netflix dilemma: can dan lin make higher-quality movies while spending less money, stream it or skip it: ‘lift’ on netflix, a kevin hart action-comedy aimed at an international streaming audience, stream it or skip it: ‘heart of stone’ on netflix, a tedious action-franchise hopeful starring a bland gal gadot.

Action-comedy caper-hijinks extravaganza Red Notice is famously Netflix’s most expensive movie, its budget crowning at $200 million. It also has a trio of famous stars in Ryan Reynolds, Dwayne Johnson and Gal Gadot. But considering it barely made a dent during a recent theatrical run and has earned a big shrug of indifference in terms of pre-streaming-release hype, it may become famous for being forgettable.

RED NOTICE : STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

The Gist: Once upon a time there were three golden eggs that once belonged to Cleopatra. One’s in a museum, one’s owned by a billionaire and one’s lost. There’s yer MacGuffin inventory. Now the characters, who might as well be MacGuffins too: Nolan Booth (Reynolds) is the world’s greatest art thief, self-proclaimed of course, and he schemes to snatch egg no. 1 from a museum in Rome. As the self-proclaimed world’s greatest profiler of art thieves, FBI agent John Hartley (Johnson) is gonna stop him, and he does, for a minute. But The Bishop (Gadot) is like, no, I’M the world’s greatest art thief, and ninjas off with the egg, framing Hartley for thiefly shenanigans. All this involves “globe-hopping” to CGI “locations” in ROME and BALI and RUSSIA, where the gulag awaits for the former world’s greatest profiler of art thieves. Shit sucks.

So Hartley walks into his cell, and whaddaya know, Booth is his cellmate. Of all the gin joints in the world. They do the verbal back-and-forth as only Ryan Reynolds and The Rock can, you know, like, “Hey baldilocks,” crap like that. They strike a deal: This odd couple duo will set aside their animosities and team up to steal egg no. 2, which will inevitably draw The Bishop to the scene, and Hartley can arrest her and clear his name. Sounds airtight. What could possibly go wrong. But first they have to stage a prison break, which involves bazookas and helicopters. They end up in FAKE CGI LONDON and then FAKE CGI SPAIN, where they infiltrate a costume party held by a scummy arms dealer who keeps his stolen ancient artifacts in a heavily guarded super-hyper-cyber-locked Mission: Impossible / Entrapment vault, which of course they have to concoct a convoluted scheme to open, but somehow, they end up smack in the middle of a bullfighting ring, getting their asses hammered by a future pile of sirloins and New York strips. C’mon everyone, all together now, let’s Grouchy Smurf this one: I HATE when that happens!

But. Where’s the egg no. 3? Booth thinks he knows, and it involves long-buried stolen Nazi loot, which brings them to FAKE CGI SOUTH AMERICA for a jaunt through the jungle. And of course, The Bishop is always a step ahead of these two oafs. At this point, the plot pauses so the characters can talk about their daddy issues, which I like to call Past MacGuffins. This is supposed to make us care about them a little bit as human beings, human beings who don’t always ticker-tape canned-in-heavy-syrup banter at each other — theoretically, anyway. But you do know MacGuffins ultimately mean nothing in the grand scheme of a movie, right? Well, then, we may have just found a rare treasure of our own here: the first movie in history that’s just one big MacGuffin.

What Movies Will It Remind You Of?: Take your pick of generic Rock actioners: Skyscraper , San Andreas , the Jumanji s, Faster , etc. Reynolds-wise, Red Notice has some rank Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard or Green Lantern dreck-vibes. It makes reference to Raiders of the Lost Ark , which is foolish, because this movie makes National Treasure look like The Bicycle Thief .

Performance Worth Watching: All this star power, and none of it’s worth putting an eyeball on. I plead the fifth.

Memorable Dialogue: Interpol agent Das (Ritu Arya) arrests Booth:

Das: Keep making jokes, because I’m about to send you to the worst place in the world. Booth: Your Instagram account?

Sex and Skin: None. TBPITTF: Too Busy Phoning It In To F—-.

Our Take: Red Notice is the movie equivalent of 3,000 empty calories of greasy fat and sodium, a nutritionless brain-clogging McMovie no-value meal, the Triple-Cheese McGuffin with extra bloat and a generous portion of partially gelatinated gum-based CGI. Writer-director Rawson Marshall Thurber’s ( Skyscraper ) screenplay uses witless exchanges of dialogue to patch together lifeless assemblages of noise and movement passing for action sequences. It offers diminishing returns from the first minute, and keep in mind, there are 117 more to go.

“ Red Notice is the movie equivalent of 3,000 empty calories of greasy fat and sodium, a nutritionless brain-clogging McMovie no-value meal, the Triple-Cheese McGuffin with extra bloat and a generous portion of partially gelatinated gum-based CGI.”

But it stars Dwayne Johnson, Ryan Reynolds and Gal Gadot, and their electric charisma could keep the lights on in Vegas for weeks, one might argue. For sure. But when their motive is less creative and more a hefty chunk of that $200 million, it’s a shameless endeavor. They play to their well-worn personae — respectively, amiable meathead, snarkmeister general and lowercase-Ws wonder woman — in lieu of being asked to do anything fresh or interesting. Visually, it’s an abomination, artificial lighting aimed at phony sets and overdressed actors, wads of plastic baking under the heat lamps. It all looks very expensive and very atrocious, making one wonder about the true value of American currency. It’s just paper, right? And paper burns very easily.

“Dreck” is too kind a word to levy at this thing. Red Notice is hopeless, destined to be turned off or slept through. The plot is a series of double- and triple-crosses, and the quadruple-cross victimizes you, should you watch it in its entirety. Technically, it’s a movie, but even more technically, it’s product. Useless, disposable product.

Our Call: SKIP IT. Witless, lifeless, shameless, hopeless, useless — pointless.

Will you stream or skip the star-studded action comedy #RedNotice on @netflix ? #SIOSI — Decider (@decider) November 12, 2021

John Serba is a freelance writer and film critic based in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Read more of his work at johnserbaatlarge.com or follow him on Twitter: @johnserba .

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Language, violence in global cat-and-mouse caper.

A Lot or a Little?

What you will—and won't—find in this movie.

Some loyalty and male bonding seen. Thieves use th

Everyone seems to have father issues in this film.

Characters are racially diverse and many have acce

Characters fight, kick, punch, hit. They get stran

Some jokes about penises and mention of "erection"

"F--k," "s--t," "bulls--t," "bitch," "son of a bit

Porsche, FBI, Interpol, Instagram, Segway, Jenga,

Characters drink alcohol in moderation in various

Parents need to know that Red Notice is a globetrotting action-adventure starring Ryan Reynolds, Gal Gadot, and Dwayne Johnson. Expect lots of action violence: Characters fight, kick, punch, and hit, and they get strangled, tied up, electrocuted, chased and tossed by a bull, and poisoned. They fall from great…

Positive Messages

Some loyalty and male bonding seen. Thieves use their cunning and talents to escape situations.

Positive Role Models

Everyone seems to have father issues in this film. They explain away their own behavior based on the treatment (or lack of attention) they received from their dads. A female character outsmarts and outfights two men. Characters are driven by greed and/or pursuit of fame.

Diverse Representations

Characters are racially diverse and many have accents when speaking English. The film is set in countries around the world, including Egypt, Italy, Indonesia, Russia, England, Spain, Argentina, and France.

Did we miss something on diversity? Suggest an update.

Violence & Scariness

Characters fight, kick, punch, hit. They get strangled, tied up, electrocuted, chased and tossed by a bull, poisoned. They fall from great heights, get shot at, shoot at others, and are chased on foot, in cars, and by air. Bombs, explosions, fires, car crashes. A bridge collapses under a person. People are left wounded or unconscious. A man is said to have a penchant for strangling others ever since his dad tried to strangle him at 14; he later says he killed his dad by gunshot. Very brief mention of suicide and "black sites." Nazis and Nazi symbols play a role.

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Violence & Scariness in your kid's entertainment guide.

Sex, Romance & Nudity

Some jokes about penises and mention of "erection" as well as other sexual innuendo. Two characters share a sexy dance. Men are seen from the waist up in a prison shower. Loaded mention of someone's browser history. A man says he could make a deepfake video of someone "mouth-sexing a goat."

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Sex, Romance & Nudity in your kid's entertainment guide.

"F--k," "s--t," "bulls--t," "bitch," "son of a bitch," "ass," "a--hole," "penis," "d--khead," "dip-d--k," "piss off," "idiot," "stupid." "God" and "Jesus" used as exclamations. It appears that prison guards' shirts read "HOMO" backward.

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Language in your kid's entertainment guide.

Products & Purchases

Porsche, FBI, Interpol, Instagram, Segway, Jenga, Alexa.

Drinking, Drugs & Smoking

Characters drink alcohol in moderation in various scenes.

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Drinking, Drugs & Smoking in your kid's entertainment guide.

Parents Need to Know

Parents need to know that Red Notice is a globetrotting action-adventure starring Ryan Reynolds , Gal Gadot , and Dwayne Johnson . Expect lots of action violence: Characters fight, kick, punch, and hit, and they get strangled, tied up, electrocuted, chased and tossed by a bull, and poisoned. They fall from great heights, get shot at, shoot at others, and are chased on foot, in cars, and by air. There are bombs, explosions, fires, and car crashes. A bridge collapses under a person, and people are left wounded or unconscious. A character is said to have a penchant for strangling others ever since his dad tried to strangle him at 14; he later says he killed his dad by gunshot. There's very brief mention of suicide and "black sites." Nazis and Nazi symbols play a role. Language includes "f--k," "s--t," "bulls--t," "bitch," "son of a bitch," "ass," "a--hole," "penis," "d--khead," and "dip-d--k." It appears that prison guards' shirts read HOMO backward. There are some jokes about penises and mention of an "erection," as well as other sexual innuendo. A man says he could make a deepfake video of someone "mouth-sexing a goat." Characters all seem to have father issues. To stay in the loop on more movies like this, you can sign up for weekly Family Movie Night emails .

Where to Watch

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Community Reviews

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Based on 15 parent reviews

Fun action flick

What's the story.

In RED NOTICE, Nolan Booth ( Ryan Reynolds ) fashions himself as the world's greatest art thief, but he's continually shown up by a mystery thief who goes by the name The Bishop ( Gal Gadot ). When FBI agent John Hartley ( Dwayne Johnson ) teams up with Interpol agents, led by Inspector Das (Ritu Arya), to catch Booth, who is on Interpol's highest-level arrest warrant, The Bishop frames him in return, sending Booth and Hartley together first to prison and then on the lam. They and The Bishop are now all after a valuable antiquity -- Booth and Bishop for the million-dollar bounty, and Hartley to clear his name. But of course, nothing is as it appears, and the caper will take the players clear around the globe.

Is It Any Good?

This film would appear to have all the right ingredients for a franchise-ready adventure, yet something's notably off when the pieces are mixed together. Red Notice looks slick and boasts attractive A-list actors pulling fantastic stunts in gorgeous locations around the globe. It will find its audience. Gal Gadot is charmingly sadistic as the stunning and fierce Bishop, and she has a scene where she beats both her buff co-stars to a pulp. Dwayne Johnson plays straight man to Ryan Reynolds' tongue-in-cheek bad boy. But Reynolds' ironic one-liners come across as cloying, and his character grates on the nerves within minutes of the opening scene. There are a few very funny moments in the film, like a Russian guard liking a shirtless Putin pic on Instagram, or when Reynolds asks Johnson's character if he knows the back of his head looks like a giant male member, but mostly the banter is more obvious than amusing.

Why bother with so many international locations if the production is going to rely on stereotypes (e.g., bullfighting in Spain) and only the best-known landmarks (pyramids in Cairo, the Louvre in Paris)? Similarly, the script seems to have a constant need to overexplain things. Characters detail exactly what's just happened or is about to, in case you didn't quite get it. Gadot starts one such explanation with, "At the risk of stating the obvious," then goes on to do just that. Granted, in some cases they're lying, but it still slows (and dumbs) the action down in the moment. There's a scene where Reynolds is wearing an explorer's outfit and hat while he and Johnson crack into a Nazi crypt. The reference is obvious, but the direction still has Reynolds whistle the Indiana Jones theme song. It's as if the filmmakers don't trust us to get their references or their story points. But underestimating your audience can be insulting, and a few unanswered questions aren't always a bad thing.

Talk to Your Kids About ...

Families can talk about the various locations in Red Notice . How does the story capitalize on its many locales? Would the story or film have changed much without so many settings? Why, or why not?

How would you describe each of the main characters? Did any remind you of characters from other films you've watched?

Was the story believable? Why, or why not? Does that make a difference in your enjoyment of it?

Movie Details

• On DVD or streaming : November 12, 2021
• Cast : Dwayne Johnson , Ryan Reynolds , Gal Gadot
• Director : Rawson Marshall Thurber
• Inclusion Information : Black actors, Polynesian/Pacific Islander actors, Female actors, Middle Eastern/North African actors
• Studio : Netflix
• Genre : Action/Adventure
• Topics : Adventures , Friendship , History
• Run time : 118 minutes
• MPAA rating : PG-13
• MPAA explanation : Violence and action, some sexual references, and strong language
• Last updated : February 17, 2023

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‘Red Notice’: Netflix heist thriller so obvious, it borders on parody

Dwayne johnson, gal gadot and ryan reynolds are barely acting in the over-the-top action movie..

An FBI agent (Dwayne Johnson, left) gets mixed up with the world’s greatest thieves (Gal Gadot, Ryan Reynolds) in “Red Notice.”

The high-octane heist thriller “Red Notice” is reportedly the most expensive movie in the history of Netflix, with a budget somewhere in the $160 million neighborhood — and it certainly looks the part, with three major stars sharing top billing and all sorts of swooping camera angles capturing a number of high-production-level action sequences involving prison escapes and helicopter hijinks and elaborate chases and all that jazz.

Problem is, there’s no movie inside this movie. It’s a breezy and intermittently entertaining and super slick work, but it’s filled with so many overly familiar notes and well-worn cliches, and there are so many winking nods to the viewer, it feels as if we’re about two rewrites away from this thing being a flat-out spoof on the level of “Airplane!” or “Hot Shots!” or “Scary Movie.” Dwayne Johnson, Gal Gadot and Ryan Reynolds are among the most charismatic stars in the world, but they collectively almost neglect to give legitimate performances here, as they’re so committed to playing off their own images, to the point where we half-expect them to take a pause halfway through the story so Johnson can demonstrate one of his badass workout routines, Reynolds can make a funny joke about his fake feud with Hugh Jackman and Gadot can start another sing-along a la her infamous “Imagine” celebrity medley. (As it is, there’s a gratuitous in-joke about Johnson’s fast-and-furious rival Vin Diesel.)

In fact, Gadot’s character, who is known as The Bishop, does sing an iconic pop standard from a half-century ago, delivering a rendition of “Downtown,” and that makes it two straight weeks for a cappella takes on that Petula Clark standard, and I much preferred the Anya Taylor-Joy version in “Last Night in Soho.” Here, Gadot sings “Downtown” while administering jumper-cable shock torture to a character’s testicles. She’s going downtown , get it? That’s the level of sophisticated alleged humor on display in “Red Notice.”

Ah, but let’s go back to the beginning, with the obligatory origins story setting up the convoluted and increasingly ridiculous storyline, which is so over the top they could have gone to animation in the final scenes. It’s all about “The Mystery of Cleopatra’s Third Egg,” and no, it’s not some time-traveling fertilization story. According to the lore, Mark Antony pledged his love to Cleopatra by presenting her with three bejeweled eggs, “each one more exquisite than the last,” as we’re told in voice-over. For centuries, these treasured eggs were lost to history, but two of the eggs were discovered in the early 20 th century, and in present day, one egg is in a museum in Rome, one belongs to a private collector, and the third — well, that will be revealed in due time, my friend.

Dwayne Johnson is the FBI’s top forensic profiler, one John Hartley, who arrives at the aforementioned Italian museum with Rita Arya’s Interpol Inspector Urvashi Das, as they’ve been tipped off that the world-famous thief Nolan Booth (Ryan Reynolds) is planning to steal one of Cleopatra’s eggs that very day.

“Your badge is no good here,” says Inspector Das, “so no American cowboy stuff.”

“Don’t worry, I left my chaps at home,” comes the retort, and away we go.

Sure enough, Booth has the egg, and as he dashes away, Inspector Das exclaims to her troops, “He’s heading for the exit!” GOOD GUESS.

After an elongated sequence featuring construction scaffolding straight out of a Rube Goldberg cartoon, snappy banter between Booth and Hartley in which Booth comments on Hartley’s snazzy leather jacket and his giant bald head, some CGI background stuff that has both Booth and Hartley hanging from the edge of a building before plummeting down to the usual convenient awning — oh and let’s not forget some painfully obvious product placement for Coca-Cola and Porsche — Booth manages to escape, and soon Inspector Das is led to believe Hartley isn’t even with the FBI and in fact he’s the real thief here. Eventually both Hartley and Booth are confined in a Russian gulag, where Booth keeps commenting on their budding friendship and Hartley keeps saying they are not friends, even though they share twin “my father was terrible” stories.

Along the way, we meet Gal Gadot’s The Bishop, who is the world’s greatest thief (Booth is No. 2) and is using Hartley and Booth as pawns, get it, as she masterminds a long con designed to take possession of all three eggs. That plan involves a narcissistic arms dealer named Sotto Voce (Chris Diamantopoulos), who is forever taking off his shirt to reveal his tattooed torso and talks in an exaggerated whisper as if he’s in a James Bond spoof film and who happens to own the second egg, at least for now. Sotto Voce thinks The Bishop is in love with him, which makes him yet another sucker in her game.

“Red Notice” takes one twist and turn after another, none of them particularly clever, as the dialogue is filled with references to movies such as “Sullivan’s Travels,” “Pulp Fiction,” “Raiders of the Lost Ark” and “Jurassic Park,” which only serve to remind us we’d rather be watching “Sullivan’s Travels,” “Pulp Fiction,” “Raiders of the Lost Ark” or “Jurassic Park.”

Thanks for the notice.

Red Notice Review: Stand Up And Take Notice Of All The Clichés

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Red Notice is officially streaming on Netflix, where it currently sits in the Number 1 spot among America’s most watched projects.

This audience approval, but more so the mingling of such in-demand blockbuster leads as Gal Gadot, Ryan Reynolds, and Dwayne Johnson, even has said stars of the action-comedy buzzing – with tongues firmly in cheek, of course – that it might be the beginning of a working relationship that could break the barrier between the Marvel and DC cinematic universes.

Assuming that’s something the people want or care about, is the overt stoking of that flickering flame an indication of anything positive or worth giving the movie a recommendation?

Not exactly.

RED NOTICE – (L-R) Dwayne Johnson is the FBI’s top profiler John Hartley, Gal Gadot is the world’s most wanted art thief “The Bishop” and Ryan Reynolds is the world’s greatest art thief Nolan Booth in Netflix’s RED NOTICE. Directed and written by Rawson Marshall Thurber, RED NOTICE is releasing November 12, 2021. Cr: Frank Masi / Netflix © 2021

Related: Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson Enlists Gal Gadot And Ryan Reynolds To Help Realize A Marvel And DC Cinematic Crossover

Everybody with anywhere between $300 million or a billion to burn is after the three missing eggs of Cleopatra, the most coveted and unattainable objects on the international black market, including the so-called “World’s Greatest Con-Man”, Nolan Booth (Ryan Reynolds).

With Interpol and Agent John Hartley (Dwayne Johnson) on his tail, Nolan manages to slips through their fingers again and again with the precious golden prizes.

Law enforcement eventually capture him but it doesn’t stick, as soon Hartley finds himself framed by a third party and equally ambitious art thief, The Bishop (Gal Gadot).

Red Notice. (Pictured) Gal Gadot as The Bishop in Red Notice. Cr. Frank Masi/Netflix © 2021

Of course, his only ally or tag team partner on the mission to clear his name and retrieve all the eggs before the fierce vixen Bishop can?

That’s right, the con man Booth. Usual globetrotting tomfoolery ensues.

Red Notice. (L to R) Dwayne Johnson as John Hartley and Ryan Reynolds as Nolan Booth in Red Notice. Cr. Frank Masi/Netflix © 2021

Related Rumor: Wonder Woman 3 To Feature Guest Appearances By Supergirl and Hawkgirl

For all the promise in its cast, Red Notice is fairly basic.

I argue its main players, specifically “The Rock” Mr. Johnson, phone it in a little. It’s not that they aren’t entertaining, but rather just uninspired, as it seems as if the film’s stars are just drawing on things they did better in other movies.

Johnson does what he knows best, looking tough before saying something funny, and Reynolds’ performance leaves little doubt that he’s just playing the same guy in every picture.

Red Notice. (Pictured) Ryan Reynolds as Nolan Booth in Red Notice. Cr. Netflix © 2021

This film is directed and written by Rawson Marshall Thurber, who was also the mind behind Dodgeball, Central Intelligence, and Skyscraper (otherwise known as two of his other adventurous misfires with The Rock), so you should know what to expect simply by going by his name and usual cast selection.

The only exception is Gal Gadot, who appears to be having more fun than she did playing Wonder Woman.

She certainly smiles a lot more and gets some funny lines throughout the film, so you get to see a somewhat of a different side to her compared to her role as the Amazonian princess.

Related Rumor: Ryan Reynolds’ Deadpool Makes The Jump to the MCU in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness

The problem is you can take her out of Wonder Woman, but you can’t take the Wonder Woman out of her, and from time to time that fact took me out of the movie.

She is as much the character as Lynda Carter is/was and as much as Christopher Reeve and Henry Cavill – like Eddie Brock to a symbiote – are bonded to Superman.

Red Verdict

We’ve all seen various scenes in Red Notice play out the same way in countless other movies – some of which came out in the last four years and some that even star Johnson, Reynolds, and Gadot.

Remember the prison break and riot in Black Widow last summer? The run across a collapsing bridge seen in Final Destination 5?

Red Notice. Cr. Netflix © 2021

Related: Ryan Reynolds Explains Why He Poked Fun at His Green Lantern Stint in Deadpool

What about the the costume ball hosted by a rich villain, ala Cruella? Or even the shootout/car chase during an excavation of lost Nazi loot seen in Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark?

It’s all here, and it leaves the film feeling as if its only endgame is to recreate those same action set pieces, just with this trio of actors.

If Johnson or any of the stars of this picture are still high on the idea of a multiverse-breaking crossover with Black Adam, Wonder Woman, and Deadpool, they are better off waiting to see how the Black Adam film, The Flash, and Spider-Man: No Way Home perform first.

I’d warn them additionally that that kind of Marvel/DC mash-up would turn out the same as Red Notice if the team involved, including this film’s lead trio, doesn’t watch themselves.

Red Notice. (L to R) Ryan Reynolds as Nolan Booth, Dwayne Johnson as John Hartley and Gal Gadot as The Bishop in Red Notice. Cr. Netflix © 2021

Related: Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson Says His Production Company Will Use Rubber Guns Instead Of Real Guns Moving Forward

Ultimately, I’m going to score Red Notice based on whether this latest from Netflix is worth your time, rather than overall quality.

That said, it’s not as bad as Doom but, all the same, you can definitely skip it.

RED NOTICE – (L-R) Ryan Reynolds is Nolan Booth and Dwayne Johnson is John Hartley in Netflix’s RED NOTICE. Directed and written by Rawson Marshall Thurber; RED NOTICE is releasing November 12, 2021. Cr: Frank Masi / Netflix © 2021

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Ahead of its Netflix release, the reviews for Red Notice  have been decisively negative, with only a 44 percent critic rating on Rotten Tomatoes . Though critical consensus doesn't always translate to a movie's box office or streaming success, this early response does not bode well for what is reportedly Netflix's most expensive original production. With a budget of over $160 million, Red Notice reviewers have largely been wondering what all of that money was actually spent on.

At first glance, the Red Notice film possesses many winning elements that should have worked. The Netflix blockbuster stars well-liked and big names in Dwayne Johnson, Ryan Reynolds, and Gal Gadot, who all fight to be the first to locate bejeweled eggs that have been scattered around the world. However, while  Red Notice  was inspired by popular heist movies like Raiders of the Lost Ark and National Treasure , it   ultimately lacks what made those films so successful.

Related:  Why It Doesn't Matter For The Rock That Red Notice's Box Office Is So Bad

Many critics lament where Red Notice  goes wrong, questioning how a movie with such popular actors and a tried and true formula could produce something so lifeless. It would likely have been better praised if it took more risks, since the final product simply repeats many of the story beats that have been done before. Here's what some of the Red Notice reviews are saying:

"Filled with an excess of everything (including, weirdly, Paul Hollywood), and clearly terrified of taking even the smallest of risks, it’s a $200 million blockbuster buffet aimed at anyone and everyone."

The Guardian : 

"So concerned with knitting together a mess of double-crosses and false endings that it loses the propulsive drive and excitement of the films it imitates."

The Wrap : 

"Alas, writer-director Rawson Marshall Thurber … just doesn’t know when to quit. The winks, the nudges, the stunts and the surprises come in such a barrage that at some point the charm leaks out of 'Red Notice,' leaving only exhaustion behind."

Roger Ebert : 

"Thurber’s direction seems to have been simply to put Reynolds, Johnson, and Gadot on camera and allow their screen presence and familiar techniques to carry the story, and one can literally see the weight of that on their shoulders."

The Independent : 

"This action caper is less a film than a collection of buzzwords."

These Red Notice reviews make it clear that the film is far more concerned with dazzling audiences with more of everything—more humor, more fast-paced action, and more star power—than with creating a compelling narrative. Inspired by other heist films and buddy comedies, Red Notice does nothing to stand out from what it imitates. Director Thurber has created other action flicks with Johnson before, like Central Intelligence and the movie  Skyscraper , but here he seems less sure of how much is too much. Johnson, Reynolds, and Gadot's charms oddly end up not working as well together on screen as they should have, despite how much the movie clearly depended on their chemistry. Either the plot is far too thin for even the leads' charisma to overcome, or the actors have simply grown tired of playing the same old roles. Yet, despite the negativity of most of the reviews, some do note areas in which Red Notice  holds its own:

Screen Rant :

"Ultimately, anyone who enjoys star-driven action movies will find something to like about  Red Notice ."

Hollywood Reporter : 

"You can’t argue with the muscular marquee value of headlining Dwayne Johnson, Ryan Reynolds and Gal Gadot in a slick, fast-paced action thriller laced with playful comedy, even if it’s an empty-calorie entertainment like  Red Notice ."

"It’s all reasonably clever, so long as you don’t scrutinize it too closely."

Although many critics argued that Johnson, Reynolds, and Gadot were not given enough to make the  Red Notice  movie work, some did praise their efforts, claiming their chemistry was able to save the project. Even if it never quite shines, some of the comedy does land, and the action sufficiently draws in willing viewers. For those either not looking for something too serious, or satisfied with a movie that provides fun action sequences and little else, Red Notice is the ideal film.

Next:  American Rust: Why The Reviews Are So Bad

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