Lift Review: F Gary Gray, the proud director of a few popular heist films such as Fast & Furious 8 and The Italian Job, returns to direct Netflix’s latest iteration of the genre with a comical tinge, that doesn’t characteristically fly with the usual hilarious quotient raised by its leading man, also lifting the film up as one of its producers – Kevin Hart. Written by Daniel Kunka, the 1 hour 46 minutes long film also stars Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Úrsula Corberó, Kim Yoon-ji, Vincent D’Onofrio, Jean Reno, Billy Magnussen, Viveik Kalra, Sam Worthington and Jacob Batalon.
With all these big names at the centre, the film revolves around a professional heist crew, led by a rather softie who only steals art from all those deserving the loss. In a Suicide Squad-natured twist of fate, they’re tasked by Interpol to achieve the impossible, i.e. steal half a billion dollars worth gold on a plane in the air, that too from a big bad who’s ready to pull the plug on citizens’ safety and the prevailing order at any mere inconvenience that goes against him.
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Lift Movie Review 2024 Contains No Spoilers
Lift Review
Right from the first glance at this cheesy Kevin Hart Netflix movie, you’ll be reminded of a dozen heist movies like Fast & Furious franchise, The Italian Job, the Ocean’s film series, Now You See Me and more others. Hart’s character too takes on the leading role of the Boss, yet he never rises to the job as the main character, rather he comes up as an unlikely reminder of Vin Diesel’s Dom, who’s all about keeping the “family” together, but only flimsier.
Despite sporting an attractive supporting cast that makes up for the rest of the heist crew “lifting” all these art pieces, now even surrendering to the modern transition to NFTs, the main cast never manages to catch your eye. Kevin Hart and Gugu Mbatha-Raw’s frail chemistry unconvincingly hopes to seize some time screen, but the spark is just not there. The few people who still manage to catch your eye in the midst of this crummy plot are Úrsula Corberó’s Camila the Pilot, Billy Magnussen as Magnus the Safecracker and Kim Yoon-ji’s Mi-sun the Hacker.
Alongside them, we also find Vincent D’Onofrio, who otherwise plays the formidably memorable Kingpin in the MCU, here sticking to a further subsidiary role that frankly has no substance or purpose at all, yet at least he seems to be owning the senseless awkwardness of this obviously unimaginative piece of filmmaking. Down below Sam Worthington also gets dragged into the mix as an Interpol agent who just leaves you feeling indifferent about his character, and himself gets smacked in the face in the finale for it.
Despite all the big-shot names in the lot, Lift appears to be severely self-aware of its hackneyed and trite approach. It merely seems to have been produced for the heck of it and to obviously keep up Netflix’s banner of over-producing run-of-the-mill and ordinarily predictable titles that lean on endless streaks of the genre to work out new staleness that’ll quantify as a strict one-time watch.
On the other hand, it also passes off as a dry feel-good addition to weekend watches when you want to switch off your brain. After having accepted its below average existence, you may come to realise that the film’s first half that requires this crew to come together and make up their mind for an improbably out-of-the-box mission, as compared to their usual choice of assignments, is more satisfying than the latter quarter that brings down the ‘1000-times-seen-before’ finale twist.
It may pass off as a common judgement, but the casting choice to let Hart lead this mission as the Boss minus all the bravado (as quintessential heist leaders usually possess) fell completely off the radar. He’s resided in the sidekick arena far too long that when he actually attempts to land a heroic punchline, hoping for an empathetic reaction from Mbatha-Raw and the audience, it all falls flat.
Lift Netflix Movie: Final Thoughts
Movies like Lift are a reminder why going to the theatres and watching a larger than life spectacle once in a while used to be such a big deal, because OTT films like so merely offer the antithetical downgrade of it all. Rest assured, it’s still a plausible weekend watch as long as you acknowledge the fact that the cast ensemble and everything in between remains underused, while blown out CGI sequences and mid mid-air combat scenes move along the plot with a pace that’s enough to keep you mindlessly entertained, while you simultaneously also recall where else you’ve seen the supporting cast and how many more such films this derivative product reminds you of.
Lift is now streaming on Netflix.
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The start was cool with somthing happening and fun lika a good movie should be, THEN ITS LIKE ONE HOUER OF PLANNING THE HEIST, cool stuff but BORED TO DEATH TO LISTENG TOO LITTLE FUKING DETAILS, some was fun ok but mostly bored so you could take a houer sleep,
A WHOLE SHIT TONS OF COMPUTER MADE EFECTS TROUGHT THE WHOLE MOVIES,
MY SCORE FOR A NETFLIX MOVIE TOO SHINE: 1,5 0F 5, nothing you have seen before, i love fast and furious because they dont talk about a hundreds small details, they j6st open a door and start drving and shows the suprise details while in missions.
Not much to see or remember, you forget it like 30 seconds after watching it, BIG BORING PART AFTER THE FIRST COOL AT START OF THE MOVIE, ANYHING ELSE FORGETABLE MESS,
NETFLIX COULD HAD DONE A AMAZING MOVIE BUT THEY FAIL AND FELL FLATT ON THEIR FACES AGAIN.
Too heavy on CGI COMPUTER MADE UP STUFF, cig is supose to help a movie not use it like 80% of the movie, and NATO dont be a part of that just RUUUN FROM IT, in this movie the ashole bosses just say FIRE AT WILL, if tge plane was a boing 747 with 300 people onbord they likly just shoot it down anyway, be drunk if youre gonna watch this I DONT KNOW WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON….its just money and gold AGAIN…