THE 355

With such a star studded cast this certainly disappoints. How Universal was able to get the likes of Jessica Chastain, Penelope Cruz, Diane Kruger, Lupita Nyong'o, and Sebastian Stan onboard outside of a payday is beyond me as this film reeks. The premise follows CIA agents Mace Browne (Chastain) and Nick Fowler (Stan) attempting to retrieve a weapon of mass destruction. No, it's not the kind you're thinking about. It's referred to as "the box," but in realty is nothing more than a hard drive with a program on it that can disrupt telecommunications, stock markets, banks, etc. A buy goes down between the aforementioned agents and Luis Rojas (Edgar Ramírez) before German agent Marie Schmidt (Kruger) interjects herself into their plan in an attempt to retrieve the box for her agency. During the operation, Fowler is removed from the equation and Browne and Schmidt, bitter rivals, have to play nice in order to achieve their objective. Insert non-spy/therapist Graciela (Cruz) and tech wiz Khadijah (Nyong'o) and you have your assembled team. Very little backstory is given about each of the characters so it's hard to invest into any of them emotionally. Throw in an extremely paint-by-numbers script along with a 'I saw that coming within 20 minutes of the opening credits' "reveal" and the story is flat. The action scenes don't generate excitement nor interest and 30 minutes in, you're waiting for the credits. Outside of Browne and Khadijah, there is zero chemistry within the group. I understand that's how it's supposed to play but the way it comes off, if they don't even care about each other, why should I as the viewer? Avoid! 4/10