THE 355 (2022)

THE 355 (2022)

Tagline: Work together or die alone.

(Action, Thriller, Non-Stop Punching) [PG-13]

That's what we do, right? We put ourselves in danger so that others are not. We all look different, speak different, but we are the same.

In this one, a weapon that can control just about any type of technology falls into the hands of a mercenary who works for the CIA named “Mace” Brown. He and her lover and partner Nick Fowler have a run-in with another agent Marie who used to work with M16, who briefly obtains the weapon but has it intercepted from her by a nefarious group hell-bent on selling it to the highest bidder. Things intensify as “Mace” brings in Khadijah a computer specialist to help her after Nick Fowler is killed. Soon Mace and Khadijah find they also need the help of Graciela and Marie if they are going to outwit the high-powered organization that is trying to prevent them from saving the world. Along the way, they discover someone else has been waiting in the wings to offer assistance. In this high-speed extreme danger arena of global corruption who can be trusted and is anything as it seems?

First off, this movie is done by the people that put THE BOURNE IDENTITY out, so the action is pretty intense and there are a lot of twists and turns. The movie even feels like it could be over at several points during its run time, but overall it’s pretty fun. 

Where this thing kind of drops the ball is in the early execution that kind of gives away one of the movie's biggest twists. I am that dude that rarely can see something coming from a mile away, but that was definitely the case in this one. I also was not crazy about the fact that in one scene Khadijah says “God is great!” and “Mace” callously replies that “that isn’t her experience with Him”. It’s kind of a weird shitty reply that feels super out of place in this movie where faith is only briefly mentioned. It’s an indicator the writer had some sort of giant stick up his butt. Like way up there. 

Where this movie succeeds is in the casting. Bingbing Fan is famous for playing Blink in X-MEN: DAYS OF FUTURE PAST and does a solid job in this. Lupita Nyong'o also kills it as Khadijah. Nyong’o is famous for her role as Nakia in BLACK PANTHER. We also get Jessica Chastain who can be a strong actress, but I couldn’t stand her character here. Penélope Cruz is also always very competent who plays Graciela and is fantastic. Overall her character has the most character development going from a scared therapist to something completely different by the end of the movie. Diane Kruger is outstanding as Marie and even plays the role with a bit of an accent. This is a strong outing for her and she is by far my favorite character in the movie. I won’t go into Jason Flemyng (THE IRON MASK) or Sebastian Stan (CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE FIRST AVENGER), who are both great actors, but both have picked some roles in movies I would never watch unless it was a hostage situation. Finally, we get Pablo Scola who is very solid in his short amount of screen time. He kind of strikes me as a “rent a Gerard Butler”.  

The action sequences are top-notch and the movie moves at a pretty breakneck speed with few pauses for storytelling but it all works. I love that this movie didn’t come across as “woke”. It honestly felt a bit like GUNPOWDER MILKSHAKE only more polished and less “dire”. Aside from the Godophobic line in the film the rest of this thing was highly enjoyable. Proof that even a predictable plot isn’t the end of the world. 

This is a solid 5 out of 7. I hope we get a second installment at some point because they definitely set it up for a sequel while still keeping this a complete movie all on its own. 

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