I always wondered what happened to Halle Berry's character Jinx, one of the few redeeming qualities of Pierce Brosnan's last Bond film, "Die Another Day". I think she just resurfaced in the new comedy espionage thriller, THE UNION.
A little older, a little more jaded, but this is exactly who Jinx would be at this point. Berry looks fantastic and beats the hell out of all adversaries as Roxanne Hall, a key member of The Union, one of those seemingly endless shadow organizations that operate just below the surface.
They are based out of a very cool London headquarters placed high in one of that city's many jaw dropping buildings. When an operation goes wrong, Roxanne inexplicably heads back to her hometown in New Jersey to kidnap her high school boyfriend, because "he's the perfect unknown guy for the job".
Mark Wahlberg is effortlessly funny as Mike McKenna, one of those thermos toting, blue collar dudes that seem to stumble out of a Home Depot commercial, waking up after their latest one night stand, heading out to grab a homemade breakfast from their Ma (the excellent Lorraine Bracco from "Goodfellas" and "The Sopranos") before heading to dangle their feet off of a skyscraper.
OK, there's nothing groundbreaking here.
But that's not to say it isn't a lot of fun.
Roxanne kidnaps Mike, whisks him off to London and begins training him in a two week crash course for his important role in saving Western Civilization. If you had time to stop and even think about this plot, it's as dumb as a tin lunchbox full of rocks.
But you won't have time, as the movie throws an excellent cast at you, rope-a-doping you with one perfectly cast actor after another.
JK Simmons (Whiplash, Spider-Man) is Simmons, the fast talking, one-liner dropping boss of the Union. His interactions with the standard CIA talking heads are laugh out loud funny.
Mike Colter (Evil, Plane) is excellent as team member Nick Faraday. Imposing, smooth and dangerous, Colter's a blast.
Jackie Earle Haley (Watchmen, The Bad News Bears) is the team member from hell as the Foreman, the sarcastic "Q" of the bunch.
The action scenes are plentiful, shot on stunning European locations and keep you laughing in all the right ways.
I found myself thinking about Peter Bogdanavich's classic "What's Up Doc?" and the duplicate suitcases in that film as the briefcase with all the superspy data bounced from rooftop to good guy to bad guy in some very fast & funny chase scenes. If I'm thinking about that 1972 classic in any reference, that's a good thing.
But the biggest adversary that the film has isn't whatever super power gains access to "that file with the name and address of every government agent in the world" (again? how many times can people try to steal this same stuff?).
The most lethal thing looming over the film is the absolute lack of chemistry between its two leads. Wahlberg is in his funniest, most action-packed, boy-from-Boston kicking ass mode and very enjoyable. Berry is a treat, engaged in the same kind of hand to hand, jaw dropping fights that she excelled in as Sofia in "John Wick 3", she also brings some moments of heart and consequence to the movie.
They're both beyond fine, they're a lot of fun.
But as a romantic couple, their chemistry is an absolute zero.
Nada.
Double O Zilch.
As long as the bad guys are circling, bullets are flying with jet boats zooming by and helicopters overhead, you don't notice. But trap these two in a shipping container for a clandestine trip back to the states and things get a bit dull very quickly.
I've seen wet matches with more spark.
Enjoy the action, don't expect much in the way of chemistry between the leads and you'll find THE UNION a pleasant Friday night diversion. I would watch JK Simmons smart ass his way through a government agency's ranks any night of the week. The city of Boise has never been so effective a punch line.
THE UNION twists and turns its way to a B-
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