Reviews
The Wrecking Crew
Having Dave Bautista and Jason Momoa star as half-brothers in a straight-to-streaming action-comedy is, on the surface, a masterstroke. Given both of their meteoric rises in their respective careers, it’s fairly surprising that they’ve never actually worked together before. So The Wrecking Crew, Prime Video’s latest offering, had me invested from the off, which perhaps makes it all the more frustrating that it fails to properly harness that star power into anything that truly blows audiences away. Instead of feeling new or exciting, it settles into a very generic and ultimately forgettable narrative we’ve seen countless times before.
Directed by Angel Manuel Soto and written by Jonathan Tropper, The Wrecking Crew has a simple premise: two guys have to come together to solve a crime and kick some bad guys’ arse along the way. This time it’s estranged half-brothers James (Dave Bautista), a Navy SEAL, and Jonny (Jason Momoa), a drunken Oklahoma cop whose life is falling apart after his now ex-girlfriend Valentina (Morena Baccarin) leaves him. The pair are forced to reunite after many years to investigate the mysterious death of their father in an apparent hit-and-run.
Of course, for a movie like this to work, there needs to be more than meets the eye. After Jonny is visited by three members of the Yakuza, who are dealt with in a surprisingly gruesome yet entertaining opening salvo, he realises there’s far more to his father’s death than he was led to believe. He immediately heads to Hawaii to find out what actually happened.
I would love to sit here and say that from this point The Wrecking Crew takes audiences down a fresh and exciting narrative path, but unfortunately, fairly early on it slips into familiar territory. It becomes bloated with twists and turns that can be seen coming from a mile away, likely to provoke more eye rolls than genuine surprise or tension.
For an action-comedy to work, it really only needs to excel at two things: action and comedy. In that respect, The Wrecking Crew does get quite a lot right. The hand-to-hand combat sequences throughout are choreographed well and are easily the most enjoyable moments of the film. They deliver some genuinely jaw-dropping bursts of violence that stand out. A lazy comparison would be John Wick, but I can’t say it ever truly comes close to that level.
In the same breath, the gunfights and car chases, which make up a decent chunk of the action on display, leave a lot to be desired. There are multiple instances where bullets feel more like sponges, either disappearing into thin air or ricocheting unrealistically, pulling audiences out of the immersion the film works to build. One particular sequence involving an attack helicopter had me laughing out loud. Visually, it’s the one moment where the film looks outright horrendous and feels like a scene lifted straight from a bargain-bin video game.
When it comes to the comedy, the first act is strong and raises expectations that this could be a new action-comedy worth adding to the rotation. Unfortunately, that promise is short-lived. The humour quickly dries up for the remainder of the runtime, as the film leans far more heavily into family drama than the fun that was on display early on. I was thoroughly disappointed by the shift in tone.
Dave Bautista and Jason Momoa are, admittedly, very good in The Wrecking Crew, in the sense that they deliver exactly what you’d expect from them. Unlike many big-name stars who have drifted into the streaming space, they can’t be accused of phoning it in. Their on-screen chemistry goes a long way towards making the film a watchable and occasionally entertaining experience, even managing to elevate the mediocre material they’re given.
I can’t say I’m not disappointed with The Wrecking Crew. The first act shows real promise and hints at a genuinely great time, but all of the momentum and goodwill it builds is slowly lost as the film meanders towards the finish line, tidying up its predictable loose ends along the way. That’s not to say it’s bad, because it definitely isn’t. There is enjoyment to be found in places, but ultimately it feels destined to become immediately forgettable streaming filler.