Movie Review – Operation Fortune: Ruse de guerre

Operation Fortune: Ruse de Guerre is a hefty title for a lightweight spy caper that’s a pure popcorn experience you’ll forget about by the next day.

That’s not to say it’s a terrible movie that’s not worth the trip: my opening showing was unusually packed for a non-blockbuster, and people seemed to enjoy it.

There was humor, but not enough to really call this a comedy: Operation Fortune was more about moments of amusement, rather than being laugh-out-loud funny. There were shootouts, there were spies sneaking around, things blew up, there was a McGuffin that was a little difficult to figure out the point of, and there was a roster of good-caliber actors lifting up the disappointingly middling script.

Jason Statham is surprisingly underwhelming for a character that could have had lots of interesting ticks and phobias, as described in the intro scene. Statham reads everything like the man wanted to be a spy in his own movie, but lacked the innate charm to do it right.

Lifting everything up — and adding the plus onto my C grade — are Aubrey Plaza and Hugh Grant. They had the best lines and made the most of them, using charisma and levity, appending some welcome joie de vivre to their characters.

Josh Hartnett mixed in well: there was a sweetly sincere dimension to his scenes with Grant. Their storyline reminded me of Nic Cage and Pedro Pascal in the superior Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent from last year.

Director Guy Richtie — outside of the opening scene and one montage set to “Singing in the Rain” — seemed to forget about the stylish touches that define much of his oeuvre. Maybe a lot of that was chopped for a shorter runtime.

If you skip the opening trailers and the credits (stay for one extra scene very early on), you’ll be in and out in an hour and 45 minutes. At least Operation Fortune never dragged. And the scenery was lovely.

Spy things do happen and it all goes a bit quickly and inconsequentially. The banter is cute, but the cast only had so much to work with. You leave the theater without any point of what you just saw. I wish the voice mix had been a lot cleaner: much of what is said goes by quickly and mumbly. What were they doing? What was the plot about? None of this matters because there are loud shoot-ups, chases, explosions, and melee fights on a regular basis.

Honestly, save your money and view this on streaming. Besides some exotic travel framing shots, there’s nothing requiring the big screen treatment. Operation Fortune isn’t on the level of James Bond, Jason Bourne, or Mission Impossible, although I think it wants to be. I’ve been wrong before, but I doubt this is the intro to a fabulous new franchise.

I wouldn’t mind seeing Aubrey Plaza take her delightful character into a spin-off though. Are there any notable films with a female spy agent as a headliner?

Simple fun with no great stakes.

Grade: C+

About The Peetimes: Three Peetimes are up. The 1st is the best if you can make a preemptive strike. About the movie: While there isn’t a lot of plot, there’s a ton of talking, much of it fast and mumbled. So doing the Peetimes was a challenge.

There are extra scenes during, or after, the end credits of Operation Fortune: Ruse de guerre.

Rated:	(N/A) Language and Violence
Genres:	Action, Comedy, Thriller
Starring:	Jason Statham, Aubrey Plaza, Cary Elwes
Director:	Guy Ritchie
Writer(s):	Ivan Atkinson, Marn Davies, Guy Ritchie
Language:	English, Chinese
Country:	China, United States

Plot
An agent is recruited by a global intelligence alliance to track down and stop the sale of a deadly weapons technology that threatens to disrupt the world order.