Pun Salad

I might not have watched this movie on Netflix if not for the review from Armond White in National Review. He hates everything! And is this damning with faint praise?: "It’s a crock, but it’s the closest a Millennial film has come to recognizing the existence of the working class."

I liked it OK. And if you're wondering what Mark Wahlberg, Halle Barry, and J. K. Simmons are up to these days… it's well, this. (Also: Dana Delaney, Jackie Earle Haley, Lorraine Bracco.)

Mark Wahlberg plays Mike, a construction worker who's schtupping his old high school English teacher (Ms. Delaney). Out of nowhere comes Roxanne (Ms. Berry), Mike's old high school flame. Who promptly tranquilizes him and swoops him off to London. (You don't expect that sort of behavior from a girl you haven't seen in decades.)

It turns out that Roxanne works for "The Union", a spy organization even more secretive than the CIA. And she's fresh off a disastrous mission where a bunch of her fellow spies were killed, so she's looking for (literal, I guess) new blood. What follows is pretty standard fare, but I stayed awake and interested, which is a good sign.

And there's an obvious setup for at least one sequel. I'm in.