Pun Salad

I went into this Netflix free-to-me streamer with low expectations. My attitude: "No matter how bad it is, at least Gal Gadot is in it." I was pleasantly surprised.

It's the story of an expert art thief Nolan Booth (Ryan Reynolds) and his (apparent) FBI nemesis John Hartley (Dwayne Johnson). As the movie opens, Hartley is teaming up with Interpol cop Urvashi Das (Ritu Arya) to thwart Booth's expected filching of one of Cleopatra's three eggs, priceless antiquities from Egypt. As it turns out, Booth has already grabbed the egg before Booth and Das arrive on the scene, but he's still hanging around, which sets off a fanciful action-packed chase scene.

And things just get more manic from there. It turns out there's a buyer willing to may an exorbitant sum for all three eggs. This brings "The Bishop" (Ms. Gadot) into the plot as well, trying to outwit and outmaneuver Booth, while Hartley wants (apparently) to put both in jail.

It's a half-comedy, playing off Reynolds' unmatched skills at banter. The Rock does a pretty good job as straight man. And Ms. Gadot is pretty good too, getting off some zingers on her own.

It seems remarkably high-budget for a Netflix flick. It was released in theaters a week before it showed up for streaming. According to the Wikipedia page, it had a $200 million budget and made "well north" of $2 million in theaters. Wikipedia also claims it got "generally unfavorable reviews", but don't listen to those guys.