On November 5th, 2021, Netflix Subscribers were pleased to receive a Netflix original movie called Red Notice. The action and comedy films starred big Hollywood names such as Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, Ryan Reynolds, and Gal Gadot. Red Notice was just another movie that showed Netflix’s forward push towards producing their own blockbuster films.

The film, directed by Rawson Thurber, follows the FBI’s top profiler, John Hartley (Dywane Johnson), as he works with Interpol to hunt down a wanted thief. Hartley finally is able to catch the wanted thief who they find is named Nolan Booth (Ryan Reynolds) and has all of his stolen artifacts in his house. The one stolen artifact, in particular, was the Faberge egg from Egypt which was stolen after Booth slipped out of Hartleys hands. Hartley and Interpol were able to recover the egg, but it is somehow stolen and the head Interpol officer accuses Hartley of stealing the egg and sends him to prison.

In the Russian prison, Hartley finds Booth and the two eventually find themselves working together. Hartley agrees to help Booth in a heist to try to find the thief who they find is called “the Bishop” (Gal Gadot). The duo is able to get out of prison and find themselves planning out their next heist while Interpol is on their tails. Hartley and Booth have to finally come together as one team to outsmart the bishop and also find the last Faberge egg to clear Hartley’s name. 

The movie as a whole was very entertaining and is something you would expect out of the pairing between Dwayne Johnson and Ryan Renyolds. The pair naturally have chemistry and it shows. Dwayne Johnson adds a little more serious side to the movie and is seen as the brawn of the duo throughout the movie while also cracking a few jokes in the process. Ryan Reynolds’s character however adds mostly comic relief. Ryan Renyolds has the quick wit humor that has become his popular attribute to many films. Gal Gadot in the film is strong and intelligent in the role of the Bishop who is always keeping the duo always one step behind her throughout the movie.

Some criticisms of the movie are that was a stereotypical heist movie. There are many points in the movie where you know that there will be a twist that will shift the plot. There are many points that are in almost every heist movie such as the person who just happens to be going for the same priceless artifact that the protagonists are going for. It also has the common occurrence where the cops, in this movie Interpol,  are always biting at the heals of the protagonist but never actually are able to put them away for good. There are some parts where it seems like the production of the movie was at its lowest. The movie on its whole was not so much a good movie in the sense of the screenplay and production, but rather a movie that is constant entertainment for the entire hour and fifty-five-minute runtime. 

The movie as a whole has performed very well on the Netflix platform, having peaked at #1 on Netflix’s popularity chart. The Film over the last 4 weeks has accumulated more than 328,800,000 hours viewed in the first 28 days of releases. This amount means Red Notice has also surpassed “Bird Box” (282,020,000 hours in 28 days) to become the most-watched movie on the entire Netflix platform. Dwayne Johnson also stated that Red Notice was Netflix’s biggest movie ever on Netflix. The Successful month for the movie has spawned talks of already creating a sequel to Red Notice and bringing back the original cast. 

Overall, Red Notice is a high-paced, action-packed, comedy that will entertain you for hours on end and is a movie you can watch multiple times without getting bored of it. There are points where it does feel still like a streaming platform-made movie, but it’s easy to put it aside. All the actors add a special aspect that makes the movie work. I would recommend for anyone who enjoys watching action or comedy movies to watch Red Notice.