Argylle

Starring: Bryce Dallas Howard, Sam Rockwell, Henry Cavill, Bryan Cranston, Dua Lipa, Ariana DeBose, Richard E. Grant, John Cena, Catherine O'Hara, Rob Delaney, Samuel L. Jackson, Sofia Boutella
Directed by: Matthew Vaughn
Rating: PG-13
Genre: Action, Comedy
2024

Times Seen:
Tim: 1

Summary: A writer (Bryce Dallas Howard) of spy novels is pulled into real-life action when the plot of her newest book seems to mirror a real-life espionage plot currently underway.

Review:

Tim: I really like Matthew Vaughn- he's been a consistently solid director. Most of his movies aren't great, but they're almost always effective and entertaining. That makes the disaster that is Argylle even more of a head-scratcher. What exactly went wrong with this film? It was a critical dud and easily one of the biggest disappointments of 2024. I read a few interviews Vaughn did where he was quite surprised by the negative reviews- it felt like he saw the movie differently than most of the world. In this case, Vaughn was wrong- Argylle is a bad movie. He assembles a great cast to deliver one of the most disappointing films I've seen in recent years. This is an absolute bomb.

The problems with this film start with the script. It tries to be one of these quirky, intelligent stories that throws unexpected twists at the audience. It takes some big swings (unfortunately, most of them whiff). The movie is never as clever as it believes itself to be, it's never as funny, never as fun. The movie tries to wink with cleverness and it ends up just coming across as either so silly that you dismiss it, or so cringe-worthy that you recoil from it. There might have been decent seeds of ideas in the story, but the narrative is a major letdown. The whole thing is just stupid. You never really believe what the film is telling you. It has logical gaps and even the things that kind of make sense aren't cool in any sense of the word. You watch this film and it feels like a complete misfire, from the opening sequence. I love ambition in a movie and I'm going to give Argylle credit for not playing it safe, but none of its attempts work very well.

I struggled with the cast, too. On paper, it's outstanding. The reality is different. Bryce Dallas Howard is really the lead and I love it so much that she was cast in this action-oriented role. Howard is a talented actress and this part was a bit unexpected (although she's done decent work in this area in the Jurassic World movies. The sad reality, though, is that her performance in this role doesn't work. The more dramatic moments and some of the comedy moments work on occasion, but the action sequences fall flat. I never believed in who her character was. Howard ends up looking pretty bad at various points of this film. The same can be said for Henry Cavill. I'll never forget that godawful haircut, but even worse is the smarmy, overly charismatic, wink-filled, stupid performance. It was terrible. Cavill looks like a complete buffoon here and is burning through goodwill he's been building up for years. Vaughn did him dirty- the look, the performance he gives, Cavill is one of the worst parts of this film and Vaughn is as much to blame as anyone. Whenever Cavill came on screen, the movie gets worse. And, for the record, I generally like him a lot.

Sam Rockwell manages to give the best performance of the film. He has bad moments, like everyone else, but mostly he works. The role is within his wheelhouse, he's most comfortable with the comedic aspects, and he sells the dramatic ones. I feel bad that Rockwell was stuck in such a bad movie, but I place zero blame on this with him. Bryan Cranston was effective in his supporting role, too. It felt like a safe and bland role, but his performance is good. Catherine O'Hara works well also and has several really nice moments. Ariana DeBose was fine, but forgettable. I have no idea why Samuel L. Jackson showed up here. His performance adds nothing to the film and he doesn't get to do anything interesting. It felt like pointless stunt casting that doesn't improve the movie in any way. The rest of the cast is fine, but not great. How Vaughn was able to assemble this talented a cast and then make them all look kinda bad is something.

The story tries to tell this winding, twisting, shocking narrative that never quite works. There's surprises, for sure- but none of it feels important, none of it feels earned. It's like the movie is trying to trick the audience in an unsatisfying way, not truly delivering a twist-filled narrative. I mostly scoffed at what was happening on screen. The action sequences are fine, but there's very few good ones. The visual effects were a bit weak- I never quite believed what was happening on screen. And then, there's some truly terrible moments. I'll call out the oil-skating scene. Oh man, you just know Vaughn was so excited about this sequence, the big action scene of the film. It just doesn't work. The whole idea isn't sold well, Howard isn't believable in making it work, and it's this hyped up, ridiculous action that is immediately dismissable. I hated that scene because the film is so proud of itself, everything pauses for this big sequence and it's just so stupid.

Now, I'm mostly being negative here because the film had so many strong components, but none of them work together. I'm not pretending Argylle is worse than it is- I've seen many worse films than this one. But, it's a easy film to dislike. The tone is wrong, the performances make you cringe, the story is stupid, and on top of all this, Vaughn makes us sit through it for 2 hours and 19 minutes! Pretty bad. There's undoubtedly worse movies of 2024, but there won't be many that had as much potential as this one did and yet completely squandered it. This is a huge disappointment. Now, as much as I disliked this film, it has decent moments, I admit that. And, I still like Vaughn a lot. Everyone has missteps. It's just a shame that his was as big as this one. I'm sincerely hoping he takes his (well-deserved) lumps, learns something, and makes his next movie significantly better than this one.

Rating 1-10
Tim's Rating- 5



If You Enjoyed This Movie, We Recommend: Jurassic World, Kick-Ass, Kingsman: The Golden Circle, Matchstick Men