Run time: 1 hour 40 minutes
It’s a brand new year, so of course Netflix had to drop a new spy movie. ‘Back in Action’ is an action-comedy…or at least it tries to be. We’re happy to see Cameron Diaz, back in action in Hollywood. Jamie Foxx, who suffered serious health issues last year is also back. But are them two back with a bang or a whimper?
Seth Gordon is responsible for directing and co-writing this project. Based on the trailer, I went into this expecting a fun movie, but one that would ultimately fail as an entry in the spy movie genre. I hate to say it, but I might have been right.
Plot summary (minimal spoilers)
The movie opens with a duo of CIA spies, Matt (Jamie Foxx) and Emily (Cameron Diaz), in a hotel room in what appears to be Switzerland getting ready for a mission. Emily is seen taking a pregnancy test (she and Matt are a thing).
Once they arrive at the mission, they take out the enemy operatives to retrieve ‘The Key’; Because every generic spy movie is obligated to have a generic MacGuffin that, for some reason, is the secret to world domination.
When the Key is secured, the two get on a private jet to go back to the US. They discuss the pregnancy and try to figure out how to raise a kid in their field of work. Turns out that their plane has been hijacked by ops who want the Key.
Long story short; they kill the ops, the plane crashes in the mountain snow and they escape using a single parachute. Matt and Emily decide to fake their death, go off the grid and give up being spies to raise their baby.
Fast forward 15 years and they now have a 14-year-old daughter, Alice, and a 12-year-old son, Leo. A chunk of the run time is spent on how Emily and her daughter Alice (McKenna Roberts) can’t ever see eye to eye, mirroring Emily’s own strained relationship with her estranged mother. Matt and Emily’s aliveness is exposed on YouTube when they get filmed defending their daughter in a club fight.
We find out that the Key, which was assumed to have been destroyed in the crash, was in fact hidden by Matt and Emily’s mother’s house (she has a severe case of mommy issues) in England. The remainder of the film is spent fighting off ops who think they have the Key and protecting their little family.
This film had the audacity to end on a semi-cliffhanger that I couldn’t even be bothered to care about.
Performances & Characters
Cameron Diaz looks as beautiful as ever and is back in her silly action movie bag. The 'Charlie's Angels' star and Jamie Foxx try to bounce off each other. Both are veterans when it comes to comedy, but the script doesn’t really give them much to work with.
Rylan Jackson does a good job of portraying Leo as a cute wide-eyed young boy. Mckenna Roberts convinces as a slightly rebellious teenage girl. Not much is expected from the child actors in this action comedy.
From the supporting cast, Jamie Demetriou (Nigel) smashes the role of a barely competent spy who is madly in love with Emily’s mother. His mannerisms and speech give the vibe that he is very unsure of himself and is more of a lover than a fighter.
Technical Film Review
Mise en scène- I don’t know if it was the budget or just complacency, but the scenery looked absolutely awful in the first action scene. First of all, the background of the Alps in one of the scenes looked like one of those fake backdrops people use on holiday cards. Then, the action scene on the plane looked so cartoonish due to the poor CGI. Netflix could have done better.
Dialogue- this film was leaning way too much on comedy and not enough on action. Unfortunately, it ended up failing at both. The dialogue was most times awkward to the point that it was difficult to watch.
Tone- this movie has the most jarring shifts between comedy and seriousness, again because of the awkward dialogue. Additionally, during the action scenes, classic romantic music like L-O-V-E was played. You could tell this film doesn’t take itself seriously. That would have been fine, except we are expected to feel some kind of tension and stakes when the family is in ‘danger’.
Writing- They could not even come up with a more creative name than ‘The Key’. It is even worse when you find out that the name they gave isn’t even connected to what the Key actually does. The concept of retired spies saving their kids could have worked in theory, but the execution was poor.
Final Verdict
This could be an enjoyable movie for some family fun on the weekend. That is, if you just want to turn your brain off.
The strengths include a relatable family dynamic and decent acting.
‘Back in Action’ makes the same classic mistakes as most generic spy movies; it is way too predictable and quite lazily written. It adds nothing new to the genre. On top of that, the film often seems to forget that it is a spy movie.
SSU Rating: 4.4/10
If you need a fix for proper Netflix espionage in 2025, I would recommend watching season 2 of ‘The Night Agent’ instead.
And that has been my unsolicited film review!
Written by: Rebecca Opio
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The movie was very mid...
For such highly rated actors as Cameron Diaz and Jamie Foxx? Nara paps. It was a bit boring. How do you come from acting something like DJANGO or Charlies Angels and then do something like that? Something is happening with today's action movies. They are too predictable and boring and they do not leave us at the edge of our sits...oh well.