Four years after his last performance in First Man (and before becoming Ken in the upcoming Barbie), Ryan Gosling portrays a man who is taken out of prison by a CIA agent -Billy Bob Thornton-, to become a member of the Sierra Program. In other words, he will be working as an assassin (under the codename Sierra Six) in the kinds of missions the CIA keeps slightly off the books. When, years later, he uncovers a secret regarding the future of the Sierra program, he is forced to escape in order to save his life from the hands -and sociopathic charm- of a former agent, played by Chris Evans, sent by the agency to do whatever is necessary to stop Gosling’s character.  

Probably, only by reading this brief summary of the plot you might have figured out how the film is going to develop – and you are probably right, considering that The Gray Man (based on the first novel of a saga, written by Mark Greaney) seems too comfortable in the familiar context of the spy genre to try anything new.

It does not matter if you have seen one recent spy film, or if you are a connoisseur of the genre, think of any cliché, and it will be present in this film. There are highly-skilled spies running away from one location to another. There are countless killers, led by a better and more sinister killer hunting our hero. There are secrets that would change the face of the agency were they to see the light of day. There are twists and turns in the script that will go so fast that you will not need to understand them all, as they might be over before you had figured them out. There are allies from our hero’s past who will help him along the way. There are high-ranking CIA officials who watch the action from dimly lit rooms, throwing coffee cups (or any other piece of crockery available at their disposal) to the walls to show their anger when their mission eventually fails. There are shootouts, car chases, and precisely choreographed fights. There is even a CGI dragon, voiced by Morgan Freeman, who helps our protagonist when the going gets tough… no, wait, that does not happen, though it would have been nice to see it, as it might have made the whole film much more memorable.

Sharing the director’s chair -although I think they might have one each at this point in their career-, the Russo brothers try to leave behind the failure of Cherry, but gone are the days in which they infused the Marvel Cinematic Universe with their own point of view, which allowed them to direct the final films of the Avengers’ saga. This time, they have made a film that seems designed by a committee keen on offering to the audience everything they have become used to, but nothing more, as it appears that the film had already been prefabricated and they just had to put all the pieces together without having any final saying in the process.

Being a hodgepodge of several spy films, in and on itself is not such a bad thing; what is bad is that there is not a single moment in which The Gray Man appears to be trying to move the genre forward, or in a different direction. Whilst sometimes is not necessary to reinvent the wheel, no effort to separate this film from any other appears to have been made. Despite its similarities to countless other actioners, it lacks the thrills of the over-the-top stunts of the Mission Impossible saga, the precise violence of John Wick and of Atomic Blonde, the suave self-awareness of any recent James Bond film, and the blunt realism of the Bourne franchise. It will probably go down as a film that will keep you entertained as you are watching it -like jingling your house keys in front of a baby’s face-, but that has been programmed to self-destruct once it finishes… so, good luck trying to remember it all.

It is less funny than it thinks it is, the action is not as good as it should have been -considering its budget-, and when it actually gets engaging (the tram chase, by far the best moment of the film), it is let-down by a middle of the road CGI. Furthermore, none of the characters are fleshed out more than a couple of stereotypes, and the story will certainly not keep you guessing at the edge of your seat after the 10-minute mark (although I must admit I was actually in one moment at the edge of my seat, as I had accidentally dropped the remote and had to pick it up).

Nevertheless, not everything is bad, as its biggest redeeming feature comes in the shape of the main cast. It is true that the central trio manages to save themselves, playing well off of each other, having charisma to spare. Nevertheless, Gosling has been better as a witty kind of action hero in The Nice Guys, Ana de Armas is doing here an extension of her role in No Time to Die, and although Chris Evans does a good job shedding his Captain America persona, he did it better and earlier in Knives Out.

Perhaps as a result of trying to make a film that ticks all of the boxes, it feels bland, and a waste of time, producing the same feeling as Red Notice recently did, although that film managed to be a bit funnier and slightly more entertaining. Obviously, Netflix might be to blame for many of the flaws of this film, as the streaming service is hellbent on its quest to achieve the perfect blockbuster. However, on its mission -and misquoting the genius of Samuel Beckett- it keeps on failing again and again, failing better every time. Perhaps, it should focus more energy on providing more opportunities to filmmakers like Martin Scorsese, Jane Campion, David Fincher, Alfonso Cuarón… and produce their films without budgetary restrictions.

I know it is selfish, and that it will surely result in less viewing hours, but I am absolutely convinced that, although the number of hours in front of our tv’s will be fewer, all of us, cinephiles, will enjoy them way more than sitting through something like The Gray Man.