Where The Man From U.N.C.L.E. Lost Me

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The Man From U.N.C.L.E. will not be getting a sequel, earning only $100 million dollars worldwide on a $75 million dollar budget. Guy Ritchie is a great director. What happened?

I only know what happened for me when I tried to watch it yesterday. It had a solid opening action sequence. Henry Cavill fit right in. Alice Vikander stood out. Armie Hammer was doing a Russian accent, which probably SOUNDED fine but was coming out of the mouth of a frat boy.

Note to Armie: Your hair is KILLING your range. That being said, his accent was a distraction, but not a deal breaker. There have been worse accents in movies that are amaze-balls. Armie's in fine company.

So, solid act one. And then, we get the movie killer:

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This is the scene where Armie and Alice have checked into a hotel posing as a couple, with the intent of infiltrating some evil cabal. It's a pretty cool big-want for the characters. Pretty big stakes. Screams "movie". So they're in the hotel room together, and what do they do to launch into their big-want?

Armie plays chess. Alice gets drunk and lures Armie to dance with her.

First of all, let's question the wisdom of the proposition that this spy movie was missing a Big Chill impromptu dance number.



But the real shame here is that this scene puts the movie I came to see on hold. These characters aren't pursuing their wants. They're at a dead stop, twiddling their thumbs, and chewing the splashy hotel room scenery. Was this decision made by the set decorator?

I stopped watching after this scene. Don't do this scene.