Red Notice is a 2021 American action comedy film written and directed by Rawson Marshall Thurber. It stars Dwayne Johnson as an FBI agent who reluctantly teams up with a renowned art thief (Ryan Reynolds) in order to catch an even more notorious criminal (Gal Gadot). The film marks the third collaboration between Thurber and Johnson following Central Intelligence (2016) and Skyscraper (2018), and the second collaboration between Johnson and Reynolds following Hobbs & Shaw (2019).
Originally planned for release by Universal Pictures, the film was acquired by Netflix for distribution. It began a limited theatrical release on November 5, 2021 before digitally streaming on the platform on November 12, 2021. The film received generally negative reviews from critics.
Two thousand years ago, Marcus Antonius gifted Cleopatra three bejeweled eggs as a wedding gift symbolizing his devotion. The eggs were lost to time until two are found by a farmer in 1907, the third remaining lost.
Shortly after arrival, they are brought to Black where she proposes to Booth they work together to find the third egg, revealing to Hartley that he does in fact know of its whereabouts. Booth declines her modest offer, and she departs stating she'll find the second egg; when she does, she warns that his share will be less. Hartley suggests he and Booth work together to beat Black. If Booth helps him imprison Black then Booth will take her place as the number one art thief in the world. The pair escape from prison and head to Valencia to steal the second egg, in the possession of notorious arms dealer Sotto Voce who is having a masquerade ball. There, they encounter Black, who also intends to steal it. The three arrive in Voce's vault where Hartley and Booth fight Black using a variety of melee weapons on display in the vault before she handcuffs them together. Voce arrives with his security detail and apprehends the men while Black reveals she and Voce are working together.
They torture Hartley and, believing Booth has divulged the location of the third egg, Black double-crosses Voce and leaves for Egypt where Booth claims it is. After leaving Valencia, Booth reveals to Hartley that the egg is in fact in Argentina, a location only he knows as it was inscribed on his late father's beloved watch which had once belonged to Adolf Hitler's personal art curator Rudolph Zeich. After the Third Reich fell in 1945, Zeich fled Europe for Argentina with the egg. The duo search the jungles of Argentina where they find a secret bunker. Inside are countless Nazi artifacts, among them the third egg. Black arrives to steal the egg from the duo at gunpoint, only to be interrupted by the arrival of Das and a team of local police. Hartley, Booth, and Black escape in an antique Mercedes, driving through an abandoned copper mine near the bunker, being chased by Das in an armored vehicle. Eventually, they exit near the top of a waterfall which they jump, landing in a lake at the bottom. Booth swims to shore with the egg, only to discover that Hartley and Black are actually romantic and professional partners, both going by the alias "Bishop". Booth surrenders the egg and they leave him handcuffed to a tree in the rainforest.
In Cairo, Hartley and Black deliver the three eggs to an Egyptian billionaire buyer, in time for his daughter's wedding (mirroring Marc Antony's original gift to Cleopatra). The gesture is overshadowed when the bride is more excited by the wedding singer Ed Sheeran. The wedding is subsequently interrupted by Das' Interpol raid. Alone on their yacht, Hartley and Black are met again by Booth who informs them that he told Das about their Cayman Islands account containing the $300 million payout from the Egyptian billionaire, which Das freezes. Booth also reveals that Interpol is on their way to capture them, but offers them a chance to escape if they help him with a new heist, which requires three individuals to pull off. They agree and escape, and Das places red notices on all three of them as they begin their heist at The Louvre in Paris.
Casting
- Dwayne Johnson as John Hartley
- Ryan Reynolds as Nolan Booth
- Gal Gadot as The Bishop
- Chris Diamantopoulos as Sotto Voce
- Ritu Arya as Urvashi Das
- Ivan Mbakop as Tambwe
- Vincenzo Amato as Director Gallo
- Rafael Petardi as Security Chief Ricci
Additionally, Daniel Bernhardt has a cameo appearance as Drago Grande, and British singer-songwriter Ed Sheeran makes an uncredited cameo as himself.
On February 8, 2018, it was announced that major studios were fighting a bidding war for the rights to an action comedy from Dwayne Johnson and writer/director Rawson Marshall Thurber. Universal Pictures, Warner Bros. Pictures, Sony Pictures and Paramount Pictures were all considered. The film would be produced by Beau Flynn through his Flynn Picture Company, and by Johnson, Dany Garcia and Hiram Garcia through their Seven Bucks Productions banner, along with Thurber's Bad Version Inc., with Wendy Jacobson executive producing. The next day, it was announced that Universal and Legendary had won the bidding war.
Gadot was confirmed to star opposite Johnson on June 11, 2018, and Ryan Reynolds was added on July 8, 2019. Ritu Arya and Chris Diamantopoulos were also cast on February 10, 2020.
Johnson was paid at least $20 million, for the first time, for the film. Gadot also made $20 million for her role, making her the third highest-paid actress in the world in 2020.
Principal photography began on January 3, 2020 in Atlanta, Georgia. Production on the film was previously expected to start in April 2019, after Johnson wrapped filming on Jumanji: The Next Level. On July 8, 2019, filming was delayed to early 2020. A planned shoot in Italy was cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic in the country. On March 14, it was announced production was halted indefinitely due to the pandemic.
Filming resumed on September 14, 2020. Gadot and Reynolds finished filming their parts by the end of October. Production in Atlanta was completed on November 14, before moving to Rome and Sardinia, Italy for a week of shooting. Filming in Italy was completed on November 18. The film was greenlit with an estimated production budget of $160 million, and by the time it was released the reported cost had reached $200 million, making it the most-costly in Netflix's history.
Visual effects artist Richard R. Hoover served as the overall visual effects supervisor for the film.
Red Notice is one of the first feature films to extensively use the first-person view (FPV) drone flying for cinematography. FPV drone pilot Johnny Schaer participated in filming.
On review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, 36% of 129 critics have given the film a positive review, with an average rating of 4.7/10. The website's critics consensus reads, "Red Notice's big budget and A-list cast add up to a slickly competent action comedy whose gaudy ingredients only make the middling results more disappointing." On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 37 out of 100, based on 37 critics, indicating "generally unfavorable reviews."
Peter Debruge of Variety called the film a "fun, fast-paced and frequently amusing divertissement," and wrote, "It's all reasonably clever, so long as you don't scrutinize it too closely. Red Notice could be Thurber's spin on National Treasure, with just as much DNA from the RKO classic Gunga Din." David Rooney of The Hollywood Reporter stated, "You can't argue with the muscular marquee value of headlining Dwayne Johnson, Ryan Reynolds and Gal Gadot in a slick, fast-paced action thriller laced with playful comedy, even if it's an empty-calorie entertainment like Red Notice."
Reviewing the film for the Los Angeles Times, Justin Chang wrote, "A depressing reminder of what Hollywood considers 'original' material these days, Red Notice plays one of those self-consciously convoluted, ultimately derivative long cons that strain so hard to seem breezily insouciant they wind up wearing you out. By the end, it's the clichés that warrant a rest."
