OUTSIDE THE WIRE (2021)

OUTSIDE THE WIRE (2021)

Tagline: Defiant by design.

(Adventure, Action, Mr. Roboto) [R]

You killed two marines. You should be in jail. Someone deemed the dollar value of your training to be higher than the lives of those two men. If you survive, Air Force keeps a pilot. You don't, you're a cautionary tale to all the other fly-by-wire a------s.

In this one, a drone pilot Lt. Harp ends up getting disciplined for conducting a drone strike against orders that killed 2 Marines but probably saved many lives. The punishment was sending him to a military zone known for heavy fighting. The fear is that rebels will get ahold of an incredible weapon and must be stopped. Leading Lt. Harp is an android officer named Capt. Leo. Can they recover the weapon before it falls into the wrong hands?

First off, this movie does not go how I expected. I think I was really thinking due to all the advertising in previews that Anthony Mackie (AVENGERS: ENDGAME) who plays Leo would be the main focus of the movie, but instead, the main character is actually Lt. Harp played by Damson Idris (THE COMMUTER). Both actors are great in this and Damson shows some pretty good range, but I think this is the first time I really didn’t like the character Mackie played from the very beginning of the movie. 

A lot of reviewers beat the crud out of this thing, but I really liked it. The ending especially was wildly satisfying, but also kind of highlighted how disturbing our future might be when it comes to technology. I think the acting overall is really good, especially the two leads, but also Michael Kelly (TRANSFORMERS: RISE OF THE BEASTS) who does a great job at playing a total jerk Eckhart, but you can also understand his anger and reservations. The motives all work and we get some great action sequences. 

I can understand complaints from critics about some of the acting coming across as silly or campy, but I really don’t think that was more than just a few moments of the film. I do wonder if this might have been better received with a less serious tone. It’s hard to say. I would watch this again, the robots are really cool when they show up. Having said that, the fact that I am not a massive fan of war films I really couldn’t get into this until the final act. Unfortunately, the final act is also where things start to feel a little inconsistent given the events earlier in the film and how they are treated. As an example. If you get punched in this movie, you are going down and in some cases, you are just not getting back up. Towards the end, if you get punched, you are totally fine to keep on fighting. Even if you get punched by a freakin robot. It just feels a bit off. That is why I am saying, if they had been a little more “loose” with the events of the entire film and not made it so serious, all of the action sequences at the end would have fit right in. 

In the movie's defense, this does happen a few times in the Terminator series where things don’t make sense “physically”, and I overlooked that, so I am admittedly being a bit nitpicky here. I do think the score was excellent and the production is really good. If anything, I do wish we had more of the robots. The sci-fi elements were all pretty awesome, but this does come across as more of a war movie than anything else. 

Overall outside the wire gets a 4 out of 7. I wish we had gotten more likable characters outside of Lt. Harp.

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