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Sylvester Stallone stabilizes this naïve action film about a rebel agent and his wife on the run.
By Jeannette Catsoulis
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Given that the finale of Michael Polish’s spies-on-the-lam thriller, “Alarum,” teases the unwelcome possibility of a sequel, please consider this review a mercy killing.
Don’t be fooled by the poster: Sylvester Stallone might feature prominently, but we’ll wait almost 25 minutes to experience the soupçon of pleasure his world-weary assassin, Chester, provides. Until then, we’re stuck with the blandly boring Scott Eastwood, a bargain-bin Ryan Reynolds whose smarmy spy, Joe, exhibits all the personality of a spent bullet casing. Joe and his slinky German wife, Lara (Willa Fitzgerald) — a.k.a. “the best trained killer in the world,” per herself — have been rogue agents for five years, after a meet-cute while falling out of the same window. Now Joe is suspected of having joined the intelligence network known as Alarum and, accordingly, Chester has been tasked with his termination.
“Chester is a mess,” says a grumpy superior. Perhaps, however, it’s not as messy as a script that prohibits me from calling the Array. Traversing dark, undifferentiated locales in Eastern Europe (the less said about the cinematography, the better), the bullet-riddled plot is a bland salad of code calls and cleanup crews, drone strikes and shootouts. It’s the kind of movie where nondescript costumes chatter in the dark. rooms, and a tree-like good looks can do more damage than an MMA fighter.
And while the acting ability may be surplus to requirements, I was saddened to see the glorious Mike Colter appear here as a supervillain who kills some of his own men to inspire obedience in his comrades. Hopefully, Colter’s sexy, tormented priest in the fabulously depraved “Evil” series (2019-24) prays that the actor’s long career includes much bigger films than this one.
AlarumRated R for endless weapon magazines and improvised gastric surgeries. Duration: 1h35. In theaters and available for rent or purchase on most major platforms.
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