Matchbox The Movie Review: ★★★☆☆ (3/5)
Matchbox The Movie has excellent car chases, a likeable cast, and enough friendship to keep things warm. But the script is thin, the jokes are uneven, and the toy connection never feels natural.
Rating: ★★★☆☆ (3/5)
Platform: Apple TV
Genre: Action Adventure
Runtime: 126 minutes
Director: Sam Hargrave
Cast: John Cena, Jessica Biel, Sam Richardson, Arturo Castro
Take a famous toy brand, turn it into a spy adventure, and bring a group of childhood friends back together. On paper, that sounds like a recipe for a good time. Matchbox The Movie gets some of it right, but not quite enough to take the top spot.
The story follows Sean, played by John Cena, an undercover CIA agent whose latest mission goes badly while he is delivering a nuclear warhead. His colleague Helen, played by Danai Gurira, tells him to lie low for ten days, so Sean heads back to his hometown.
There he meets his old friends Aimee, Crosby, Charmaine and Ted, played by Jessica Biel, Sam Richardson, Teyonah Parris and Arturo Castro. As kids, they bonded over Matchbox cars, but their lives have since gone in different directions.
The reunion does not last long. The group is kidnapped by an ambitious CIA man named Mosier, played by Corey Stoll, who believes Sean lost or stole the missing warhead. Sean rescues his friends, but now everyone is on the run.
To clear their names, they must find the weapon before someone starts a nuclear war, and that takes them across countries and into the path of spies and criminals.
Here is where the film’s strengths and weaknesses show. The writing is weak, and the story keeps adding complications that do not make it more interesting. The film wants to be a comedy, a spy thriller, and a story about friendship all at once, and the shifts between those moods can feel clumsy.
Some jokes are easy to see coming, and a lot of the dialogue seems to exist only to move everyone into position for the next action scene. A few gags will also feel familiar to anyone who has seen classic action movies.
The Matchbox link is another problem. It rarely feels like part of the story. It is there because the film is called Matchbox. A scene celebrating how the toys began is sweet, but the cars themselves do not drive the plot.
Thankfully, the action is a big step up. Director Sam Hargrave, who also made the Extraction films, knows how to shoot a car chase. The movie has plenty of crashes, fights, and wild escapes, including a highway chase from Bucharest to Budapest that is easily one of the highlights.
Many stunts feel practical rather than computer-made, which gives them real weight. The only catch is that the film does not always show why a scene matters emotionally, so a few sequences feel more tiring than thrilling.
The friendship angle gives the movie its heart. The characters are not deep, but there is an easy comfort between them, which makes their scenes more enjoyable than most of the spy business around them.
John Cena is a good fit for Sean because the role does not ask him to do too much. He handles the action easily and adds enough humor to stay likeable. Jessica Biel gives Aimee a personality beyond being the old friend, and Sam Richardson gets the funniest moments and brings much-needed laughs.
Teyonah Parris and Arturo Castro are fine, though the script gives them little to work with. The most puzzling part is Randeep Hooda, who is reduced to almost an extra in a role that wastes his talent.
There is no need to pretend Matchbox The Movie is more than it is. The plot is busy, the humor often misses, and the toy tie-in feels forced. Yet it is hard to dislike, because it keeps moving, the cars are fun to watch, and the friends give it a little warmth.
It asks very little from you, which is not a big compliment, but it is part of the charm. This is a movie for a lazy evening when you simply want to be entertained.
If you want something sharper and talkier after this, our review of The Social Reckoning looks at Aaron Sorkin’s fast Facebook thriller, and for a wilder watch, our review of Eyes covers a pulpy Malayalam series that is far-fetched but hard to stop watching.
Matchbox The Movie is now streaming on Apple TV.