‘Operation Fortune: Ruse de Guerre’ Review: Jason Statham and Aubrey Plaza in Guy Ritchie’s Tired Action Comedy

It’s fairly simple to inform that Man Ritchie’s new motion comedy has been sitting on the shelf for some time. In spite of everything, its villains embrace Ukrainian gangsters. Not that there aren’t nonetheless gangsters in Ukraine, however let’s simply say the timing isn’t ultimate.

The movie’s title offers a touch of its dumbness. Positive, using a French phrase is spectacular. However the “Fortune” in Operation Fortune: Ruse de Guerre doesn’t check with the identify of the mission, however reasonably the main character, a mercenary undercover agent named Orson Fortune, performed by Jason Statham. It may have been worse. If he have been nonetheless enjoying his character from Crank, the movie would have been referred to as Operation Chev Chelios.

If this looks like a digression, it’s as a result of there’s not loads to say about this effort for which the phrase “by-product” will need to have been invented. The story entails the theft of a lethal, world-threatening weapon referred to as “The MacGuffin” (I child), which Fortune has been employed to retrieve by a constipated-looking British operative (Cary Elwes) and his much more constipated-looking superior (Eddie Marsan, deserving higher).

To satisfy his mission, which requires heaps and plenty of worldwide journey — the areas are helpfully recognized by way of onscreen graphics apparently designed for the geography-challenged, resembling “London, England” — Fortune recruits a workforce consisting of know-how knowledgeable Sarah Fidel (Aubrey Plaza) and, nicely, one thing knowledgeable JJ Davies (rapper Bugzy Malone, who additionally appeared in Ritchie’s The Gents).

The trio set out on their mission, which entails quite a lot of flights on luxurious personal jets stocked with ultra-expensive bottles of wine supplied as a result of Fortune apparently suffers from claustrophobia, which is about as character-defining because the movie will get. To search out the weapon, they have to insinuate themselves with an uber-wealthy arms seller, Greg Simmonds, performed by Hugh Grant, sporting a cockney accent and outsized tinted glasses that Irving “Swifty” Lazar would have deemed too gaudy. To that finish, they enlist the companies of a Hollywood motion film star (Josh Hartnett, embracing the pattern of thespian self-mockery) of whom Simmonds is a big fan.

The frequent globe-trotting is interrupted by quite a few automotive chases, gun fights and hand-to-hand fight scenes demonstrating that Statham nonetheless has the martial arts abilities to simply dispatch any stunt doubles who cross his path. As standard, neither he nor his character appears to get pleasure from their work, his vary of feelings starting from managed irritation to outright annoyance. Even when ingesting that wonderful wine, Fortune acts like he’d reasonably be anyplace else. James Bond, he’s not, except you rely Timothy Dalton’s interpretation of the function.

And Bond appears to be what Ritchie goes for with this overly convoluted, barely understandable spy thriller that fails to generate any pleasure in its motion scenes and turns into too talky by far. A few of the dialogue is enjoyable, particularly as delivered by Plaza, who amusingly all the time appears to be commenting on the outlandish proceedings even whereas collaborating in them. And now that Grant’s fairly boy handsomeness has matured with age, he’s eagerly leaning into the character actor stage of his profession. Chewing the surroundings with gusto, he provides the movie a jolt of comedian power each time he’s onscreen.

Ritchie, who additionally co-wrote the script with Ivan Atkinson and Marn Davies, directs in a extra easy trend than standard, largely forgoing the kind of closely stylized visible and modifying overkill that may turn out to be migraine-inducing. His humorousness hasn’t gotten any extra refined, nonetheless, judging by the scene during which Fortune turns into distracted throughout a caper by a tv displaying the scene from Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Child that includes “Raindrops Maintain Fallin’ on My Head.” Aiming for irony, it simply makes you want you have been watching that movie as a substitute.

Exhibiting unearned self-confidence, Operation Fortune: Ruse de Guerre concludes with an apparent set-up for a sequel that’s unlikely to ever come.