Mike & Nick & Nick & Alice presents itself as a clever comedy thriller, but its reveals fall flat, and its characters become less interesting the longer the movie goes on. Photo: 20th Century Studios.
The world has been starved of a comedic thriller for some time.
Gone are the days of the Ocean’s movies, Reservoir Dogs, Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, or even the underrated 2016 gem The Nice Guys. Quite frankly, that sucks.
Where are wisecracking private investigators, fast-talking mobsters or larger-than-life thieves?
It’s honestly a shame, and it’s also exactly why I was looking forward to Disney+/Hulu’s new original movie Mike & Nick & Nick & Alice.
Pitched as a crime caper where a scary yet somewhat funny crime boss orders his best thug to make a hit on a mysterious target, who turns out to be a mysterious man who looks exactly the same as said crime boss, the film’s premise seemed destined to scratch the itch of the crime thriller.
Unfortunately, what was released ended up being not only uninteresting but straight-up unfunny, which is an extremely painful combo.
For the sake of explaining my rather drab reasoning for why this movie kinda stinks, I will be going into an early reveal (that’s your spoiler alert).
It is revealed about a quarter of the way through the movie that the original Nick, the mob boss played by Vince Vaughn, is actually a future version of the Nick that has the hit ordered on him.
Future Nick orders Mike (James Marsden) to beat up present Nick, because present Nick ends up killing Mike after figuring out he was having an affair with his wife, Alice.
Future Nick feels bad and travels back in time to try to undo Mike’s death.
Now, in terms of how to explain this intentionally messy plot, which could have been a lot of fun, mind you, time travel is by far the laziest. Maybe only second to cloning.
It’s so out of left field and just pulls the rug out from under the stylised crime caper that the early part of the film set up.
The cast takes a hit as soon as this revelation is revealed, too.
James Marsden’s stoic yet cautious confidence is thrown out the window, and instead, a bored shell of a man takes his place.
Vaughn’s turn as a mysterious and calculated gangster with a clear secret is revealed, and a babbling moron is inserted instead.
Even Eiza González’s Alice, who is presented as a femme fatale, misses the mark.
The best way to sum this up in an easy-to-understand bow is that a character named ‘Dumbass’ is introduced mere minutes after this reveal is made, and that says everything you need to know about the direction this movie takes.
Unlike other mob comedy thrillers that put their inspirations on their sleeve, Mike & Nick & Nick & Alice limps to the end of its 107-minute runtime.
At the beginning of this review, I said we have been starved of a great comedy thriller for 10 years. Unfortunately, uninspired performances and story beats that missed the mark leave us waiting even longer.
Mike & Nick & Nick & Alice is currently streaming on Disney+ in Australia.
Original Article published by Jarryd Rowley on Region Canberra.
