Review of 2 Guns (2013) by Jason F — 07 Jan 2014

Bobby (Denzel Washington): You never heard the saying, never rob a bank across from a diner with the best donuts in three counties?

I was so looking forward to seeing this movie since I like both lead actors but for an action flick, this was kind of boring and totally predictable; almost borderline stupid actually, which was too bad because conceptually, the movie would have worked, you've got two interesting, strong characters but I guess the Washinton-Wahlberg pairing just didn't click. Their chemistry was friendly enough but it wasn't dynamic enough to make the movie explosive and exciting. Vin Diesel would have probably made a better choice in place of Denzel's character or if not Will Smith in place of Wahlberg, to ad a bit more humor to the film because it was definitely lacking in something. Maybe a bigger baddie than Edward James Olmos in the role of Papi Greco. There were two great castings in this film though, Bill Paxton played "Earl" beautifully; you can count on Bill Paxton to be eccentrically kooky and he was perfect for the role. Another suprising good choice was James Marsden as Quince; Marsden who was playing against his usual heroic roles. He makes a pretty good bad guy. Overall, the film's plot had potential but it just didn't live up to it, perhaps wrong direction, wrong execution or some different actors. It must have looked good on paper, but on film, the formula just didn't work right.