The Gray Man movie review

MOVIE TITLE: The Gray Man

This dramatic and mysterious thriller by IFC Films opens in theaters on July 29, 2022, with online streaming available on July 22, 2022.

RATING: PG-13 (It could be rated R for extreme violence)

LENGTH: 2 hours 2 minutes

MOVIE REVIEW MOM GRADE: B

IN A NUTSHELL:

When the CIA’s most skilled operative (whose identity is known to none) accidentally uncovers dark agency secrets, a psychopathic former colleague puts a bounty on his head, setting off a global manhunt by international assassins.

Directed by the famous Russo brothers, you know this is going to be high action and high violence. Joe Russo co-wrote the screenplay with his reunited MCU writing team with Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely. We get to see director Joe Russo at the end of the movie playing one of the CIA executives!

THINGS I LIKED:

The powerful cast features Ryan Gosling, Chris Evans, Ana de Armas. and Billy Bob Thornton. They all did a great job, as expected.
Chris Evans had been invited to play the role of the Gray Man, he opted to play the over-the-top villain, and he looked like he had a blast doing it. He felt terrible for accidentally hitting Ryan Gosling in the face with his prop gun on the first day of filming. He and Ryan Gosling were encouraged to improvise many of their lines.
Fun fact #1: Netflix spend $200 million on this! That’s the most expensive Netflix original movie ever.
Ryan Gosling’s character has a tattoo that he explains represents a Greek figure in mythology. He doesn’t say the name, but it’s Sysiphus. It’s appropriate because the story and this character both push forward without really getting anywhere.
Fun fact #2: The scenes of Baku were actually shot in the Czech Republic.
The beautiful locations and bullet-filled set designs are fantastic. The gorgeous and massive home at the end of the movie is the Chateau de Chantilly, north of Paris.
The stunt team did an incredible job.
There were a few fight sequences that actually impressed me and reminded me of the perfectly choreographed ones in the John Wick movies.
There is some humor, but not all of it lands.
I always get a kick out of spy vs. spy action movies.

THINGS I DIDN’T LIKE:

Overly violent. Our family watched this and most of us had to close our eyes during certain scenes.
My 22-year-old son laughed a lot because so many of the scenes were so ridiculously outrageous. Many of the action scenes looked like they came straight out of unbelievable video game sequences.
Some of the dialogue was just silly and cliched.
The “Gray Man” idea is to be invisible but Ryan Gosling’s character is most definitely seen by everyone who hunts him down for 2 hours.
As expected, the professional film critics hate this, giving it a 47% on Rotten Tomatoes, while audiences are getting a kick out of it at 91%!
There are some bad CGI moments.