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The Wrecking Crew is one of those movies where you just turn your brain off and enjoy the ride, you are not getting some masterpiece here but you are getting Jason Momoa and Dave Bautista being themselves and having fun witch makes the whole thing work way better than it should and I think this is something that works just great with streaming type of movies, its almost like an in between and you dont tend to expect much so it surprise you. Two half brothers Jonny and James have not talked in years because of family drama and all that mess, their dad Walter gets killed in what looks like a hit and run but surprise surprise its not just some random accident, turns out there is Yakuza involved and a dirty developer and all this crazy underworld stuff happening on the islands. Jonny is this loose cannon cop who got suspended from his job back in Oklahoma for doing some questionable stuff, he drinks way too much and curses the entire time while James is this by the book Navy SEAL who keeps his life together and follows all the rules but even he has his own issues to deal with. When their dad dies Yakuza guys actually attack Jonny at his Oklahoma home looking for a package Walter supposedly sent him, thats when everything goes to hell because people start trying to kill them left and right and they gotta figure out who actually murdered their dad and why, the whole thing is basically them running around Hawaii causing mayhem and destroying everything in their path while trying to solve this mystery that is not that hard to figure out if you pay attention for like the first 30 min. Director Angel Manuel Soto who did Blue Beetle a couple years back knows how to shoot action and keep things interesting especially with Hawaii as the backdrop, some of those closing shots were beautiful, the action is solid but nothing you have not seen before, there is fight scenes in hallways, there is helicopter chases on highways where innocent people definitely died but nobody seems to care, there is shootouts in compounds and on streets where civilians are just getting caught in the crossfire and its kinda wild how they just brush past that like its no big deal.
- IMDB: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt33046197/
- Platform: PRIME VIDEO
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The tone for this movie is kinda of a mix because one minute its this fun buddy cop comedy with Jason making jokes and cursing everyone out, then the next minute its trying to be serious with family drama and revenge but it never really commits to either on fully so you end up with this weird mix that works sometimes but also feels messy. Jason Momoa is basically playing himself again witch is not a bad thing because he is fun to watch, he brings this energy where he is always drinking beer and making one liners and not taking anything seriously even when people are shooting at him. Dave Bautista is the straight man trying to keep things together and he does a good job balancing out Jasons craziness, their chemistry feels natural like you actually believe these dudes could be brothers even though they look nothing alike and have completely different personalities, there is this running joke where people keep commenting on how big they are and how they look like they eat steroid pancakes for breakfast witch made me laugh because its true. The supporting cast is pretty solid too with Jacob Batalon as Pika who is basically the tech guy that helps them out and he was way funnier than I expected because he was swearing his ass off the whole time, Morena Baccarin shows up as Valentina and she is great, she has this scene with chili pepper water that was so random and stupid but also hilarious, she really steals some scenes from the two big guys witch is impressive. Temuera Morrison aka Boba Fett is in this too as the Syndicate leader Mr. K and Claes Bang plays Marcus Robichaux the developer villain, the moment you see them you know they are gonna be important to the plot because they are the other recognizable faces in the cast besides the leads, they do not even try to hide it so there is no real surprise there.
The script of the movie at times felt like it tries to do too much with conspiracies and twists and connections to Hawaiian culture but it ends up feeling cluttered and unfocused, there is stuff about illegal gambling and dirty money and corrupt politicians that is nothing new or groundbraken but none of it gets looked at deeply enough to actually mean anything, they throw in these emotional aspects of the story about family and brotherhood and letting go of the past but since this two are not that serious most of they time they are together then first you dont care much about their thoughts and feelings, I guess based on the style of the movie looks like something that was planned. Jonny has this whole backstory about his mom being murdered when he was young and he been trying to find her killer for years. James actually sent Jonny away to Oklahoma to save his life from the Syndicate because Jonny was going after them for his moms death and it caused all this tension between the brothers for decades, some of the main reasons they stay apart aside form the fact they kept arguing when ever the could. That subplot gets solved in the most flat way possible you could imagine that takes so much away from the movie when Mr. K gives Jonny the name of the actual killer at the end because he appreciated that they took out the Yakuza and Jonny just burns the note with the killers name without even looking at it, its supposed to be this big moment of him letting go and self healing doing the right thing not going for revenge but it doesnt hit, same thing with James who supposedly feels guilty for being a bad brother but we dont see enough of their relationship to care when they finally make up after having a fist fight on the beach to settle their differences. The really sad part of the story is the villains because it looks like they put minimal effort on making them interesting and not been their just to fillup the place, almost like just to give this two someone to fight, Marcus Robichaux is this developer with shady business trying to build casinos which are illegal in Hawaii so obviously he is doing corrupt shit, Walter was actually hired by both Marcus and his wife Monica to investigate each other witch is kinda funny, when Monica turns up dead Jonny knows Marcus killed her and that connects everything back to their dads murder. Stephen Root shows up as the police chief who is your typical authority figure that yells at them for causing chaos but never actually stops them from doing whatever they want, where it actually shines is in the gore and the kill scenes because they did not hold back on the violence, there is a part where someones arm gets ripped off and another where a dudes face gets grated on the street like a cheese grater and it was brutal in a good way.
The action is the most fun even if its nothing too smart, the highway scene with the helicopter was over the top and ridiculous but also entertaining in a turn your brain off kind of way, same with the final shootout at Marcus compound where they just mow down dozens of guys without much effort and rescue James wife Leila and daughter Nani who got kidnapped, they lean into that 80s action vibe where the good guys never miss and the bad guys cant hit anything even from five feet away, its dumb but it works because it knows what it is and doesnt try to be something more serious or grounded. The Hawaiian setting is used well visually but they do not do much with the culture beyond surface level stuff, they mention some local things and show some scenery but it never feels real or lived in like they actually working the island, its more like Hawaii is just a backdrop for all the explosions rather than an actual character in the story. Angel Manuel Soto tries to bring some of that island respect into it and you can tell he cares about it properly, the biggest issue with The Wrecking Crew is that its trying to be too many things at once and ends up not being great at any of them, its not funny enough to be a full comedy, not serious enough to be a drama, not smart enough to be a thriller and not crazy enough to be a balls to the wall action thing like it should have been. If they had just leaned all the way into the stupidity and made it a full on brainless action fest it probably would have been way more fun, instead it keeps trying to have these moments of depth and meaning that just fall flat because the rest is so ridiculous, its the kind of thing where you watch it once and forget about it a week later, nothing about it sticks with you except maybe a couple of the gnarly kill scenes and the fact that Jason and Dave have good chemistry together.
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