Review - "The Man From U.N.C.L.E"

The Man From U.N.C.L.E - directed by Guy Ritchie

Starring: Henry Cavill, Armie Hammer, Alicia Vikander, Elizabeth Debicki, Hugh Grant, Jared Harris, Luca Calvani, Sylvester Groth, Christian Berkel, David Beckham
Running Time: 116 minutes
Rated: M - mild violence, no profanity. 

Here's another movie the appeal of which kind of crept up on me.
I had zero interest until I saw the first trailer and in no small way assisted by the realisation that Alicia Vikander was in it I grew very excited for its release.
Director Guy Ritchie's debut "Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrells" impressed me far less than pretty much everyone I know but I loved "Snatch" and love his Sherlock Holmes flicks.
The trailers for this latest Ritchie movie are loaded with cool 1960's early James Bond sort of cool meets nudge-nudge wink-wink style and I am fully onboard with it.
It does arrive with a worrying lack of hype though so I wonder if Warner Bros. isn't expecting much.
To be fair I wasn't either.
But lowered expectation can lead to pleasant surprise in a lot of cases so fingers crossed then.
Poor old Armie Hammer deserves a hit after "The Lone Ranger".

Guy Ritchie sets the tone and the style right from the opening credits.
With a very retro-cool intro complete with flashy edits and boldly coloured red lines slashing across the screen we meet American spy Napoleon Solo (Cavill) as he enters East Germany to meet Gaby (Vikander).
She is the daughter of a man forced to work on nuclear weapons for the Nazi's during the recently ended second World War.
She is to be used to track down this man.
Solo finds her not in a cocktail dress at a casino but in overalls under a car.
She is not going to be your typical female lead it seems.
But still banter ensues of the sort you would expect from a movie clearly desperate to imitate the style of 60's shows like "Mission: Impossible", "Our Man Flint", "The Avengers" and yes - "The Man From UNCLE".
To start with I didn't think Ritchie was getting away with it - it just wasn't quite gelling.
But it grew on me and I started to really enjoy the lightheartedness of the whole affair.
It is goofy fun set amidst serious events and not a million miles from the Connery Bond movies or even the 70's tv show "The Persuaders".
In fact it sold me so well that even the unevenness of Armie Hammer's Russian accent didn't even phase me.
I like Hammer's Illya Kuryakan quite a lot actually.
He and Cavill are a good pairing and as they have a lot of screen time together it is just as well!

Henry Cavill as Napoleon Solo and Armie Hammer as Illya Kuryakan - a nice pairing

The plot is pretty standard fare - nuclear weapons, exotic locales, double crossing..... it doesn't really matter.
What makes this movie as much fun as it is is the chemistry between Cavill and Hammer.
Cavill's Napolean Solo is all business and ever so serious even when he is being charming.
Ritchie utilises a lot of the flashback style cuts that he used in his Sherlock Holmes movies with quick reveals as to what was done a few minutes prior just as we are seeing the end result.
Hammer is a man mountain- all muscle and brute force.
Kuryakan is the blunt instrument to Solo's scalpel.
Seeing him tower over the petite Alicia Vikander adds an interesting angle to the growing attraction between the two characters.
Nothing too crazy is going to happen of course- the sex just like the violence is completely innocuous.
It is surely fun though.
Yes- due to the three leads but definitely in no small part due to the action.
There is a nice balance to it with a couple of vehicle chases, a boat chase, a couple of shootouts, plenty of spy highjinks involving Bond like gadgets and all spread across some very appealing locales.
Vikander gets to wear all manner of goofy 60's fashion from shades that look like Johnny Depp's from "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory" to mini-dresses straight out of "Mad Men".
There are laughs too.
I particularly liked the gleefully nasty Nazi torture scene and Kuryakan's amazing technique in disabling guards.

Elizabeth Debicki and Hugh Grant also appear

As fun as it is it isn't without issues.
There are little things that prevent this one from being just that little bit better and rising up to looking like a major hit.
As much as I like the visual style of the movie the feel wasn't quite there.
A number of the lines don't pop as much as they need to.
If you have seen the trailer you'll have heard a couple of them.
There is a stiffness to some of the dialogue combined with a self awareness that defuses some tension.
Solo and Kuryakan are always going to become fast friends and of course partners and the frequent scenes where they snipe at each other fizzle almost as often as they pop.
Some of the reveals are not as surprising as they could be too.
I won't say which for fear of spoiling anything but there were a couple of moments when the twists arrived with a clunk.
There is a clumsiness on occasion.

Alicia Vikander as Gaby

Still- I had a lot of fun with this movie.
So much so in fact that I would love to see it resonate with audiences to the point where we get a sequel.
Clearly this is intended as a franchise starter and I hope that it succeeds.
With a couple of the rough edges shaved back and with the relationships all now in place it could produce two or three more fun flicks like this one.
Hopefully even just a little bit better.
And I freely confess that any excuse to see more Alicia Vikander on a large screen sounds good to me.
"The Man From UNCLE" is a frustratingly 'almost' movie.
Very good, a lot of fun for sure but is it enough?

RATING: 72/ 100

CONCLUSION:  Close but not quite there this is still a lot of fun.  I genuinely hope that it performs well enough to justify a sequel that irons out the wrinkles.