Role Play (2023)

Information

Siskoid
Definitely not expecting Role Play to be great - just a gender-reversed, streaming-quality version of True Lies - but I've always responded positively to the comedy espionage genre, and could I resist David Oyelowo (not exactly back in a spy's shoes here, but I loved MI-5) and Bill Nighy (indeed, his scenes turn out to be the best thing about this unambitious movie. Kaley Cuoco is fine as an acerbic assassin-for-hire trying to quit the life, and almost better as the loving wife and mother of two, and the film has some charm by not being cynical about those relationships. While many have criticized this as a remix of better material (that's true), I don't agree that its dialog, for example, is some kind of A.I. aberration. While I'm not handing out Oscars or anything, for me, the film had fun with its dialog and didn't sound like the copy/paste job of many action films. The third act is rather thin as we get into rather plainly-staged action and far too few consequences, undermining the stakes, so on the low end of 3 out of 5 stars, 3 already being my "forgettable, but entertains for most of its length" rating. 3 months 1 week ago