BACK IN ACTION (2025)
Starring Jamie Foxx, Cameron Diaz, Andrew Scott, Jamie Demetriou, Kyle Chandler, Glenn Close, McKenna Roberts, Rylan Jackson, Fola Evans-Akingbola, Robert Besta, Bashir Salahuddin, Tom Brittney, Ben VanderMey, Jude Mack, Luyanda Unati Lewis-Nyawo, Tobi Bamtefa, Leela Owen, Cruz Hadley, Zion James, Ivan Ivashkin and Katrina Durden.
Screenplay by Seth Gordon & Brendan O'Brien.
Directed by Seth Gordon.
Distributed by Netflix. 114 minutes. Rated PG-13.
Back in Action lands with a lot of baggage for a cheesy Netflix spy caper. First of all, this is the film in which Cameron Diaz returned to acting after an 11-year retirement from the craft. It sort of makes you wonder, fairly or not, whether this was the script that really should have lured the actress back to work. Is it worthy of this terrifically eccentric talent? (In all fairness, her last two films before packing it in were Annie and Sex Tape in 2014, so it’s not like she didn’t have a reason to give things up in the first place.)
Even more importantly, Back in Action was the film which Jamie Foxx was making a couple of years ago when he was suddenly stricken of a mysterious malady which may or may not have had the actor close to death. (At the time of it happening, everyone was very careful not to give any specifics as to what happened to Foxx, although later it came out that he had a brain bleed which led to a stroke.)
So, like I said, that’s a whole lot of background complication for what is essentially a dumb spy flick. Doubly so for one that is going straight to streaming.
So is Back in Action worthy of dragging Diaz out of sabbatical? Well, honestly, the role is way beneath her, but she makes it better than it could or should be just with her acting chops and personality. She is, undoubtedly, the best part of Back in Action. (Glenn Close also has some nice moments as Diaz’ mother.)
And was Foxx able to make the role his own after his own fight with mortality? Well, that’s a more complicated question. Foxx seems strangely detached from the film, but that may not have necessarily been health-based. Sadly, Foxx does that with a certain amount of regularity these days. Not that he’s not sometimes a very good actor, but he often doesn’t seem to give his all, and that seems to be the case here.
Of course, the question is, did anyone ever think this film was going to be anything but disposable fluff? Netflix has made a pretty penny by making films which are video wallpaper, something you can put on in the background while doing other things, occasionally looking up when something particularly notable happens.
Streaming services have a whole series of similar spy comedies – mixtures of big-name stars slumming for a paycheck, incredibly gorgeous settings, little in the way of story but lots of big explosions. In fact, if you have seen The Gray Man, Heart of Stone, Red Notice, The Union and Role Play, you have essentially seen Back in Action.
There is nothing overtly bad about Back in Action, but there is nothing particularly memorable about it, either. It all seems very unnecessary.
I’m glad that Diaz is back in action (and that Foxx is back on the mend), but I wish it was all done for a more worthy project.
Jay S. Jacobs
Copyright ©2025 PopEntertainment.com. All rights reserved. Posted: January 18, 2025.
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