The Fix Review: Plenty of Guns and Action, Not Enough Story

A thriller can fire a thousand rounds and still miss its target. The Fix comes close to proving it. The movie opens well, with an Afghanistan mission that grips from the first frame. The trouble starts when the film moves on. The jumps from Afghanistan to civilian life in the US, then to Iran, the Iran-Azerbaijan border and back home again never feel earned. The screenplay has genuinely good ideas but lacks the craft to carry its story beats across settings. The film hops locations at the drop of a hat and plays like a string of disjointed chapters.

Disillusioned by the end of the war in Afghanistan, a band of disgraced ex-CIA operatives finds itself adrift back home, with old skills and nowhere to use them. Tucker (Zachary Levi) pulls the remnants of his old unit together, when Larry (Liam Neeson), a veteran operative who has long been his mentor, in the mix, reveals that they’ll get $24 million in Hotel Tehran. The story on paper has all the promise in the world. But eventually, the story turns out to be the weak link in this action thriller.

The gunfights are the film’s biggest strength. They are cleanly choreographed, and Zachary Levi and his squad handle their weapons like seasoned professionals. Yet the impact keeps getting diluted by the dramatic scenes that precede or follow them. Director Guy Moshe piles on twist after twist, almost reminding one of Abbas Mustan’s films from the 1990s and early 2000s. And that’s not such a good thing here. For example, the central arc linking Levi’s and Liam Neeson’s characters is so outlandish it feels like a Michael Bay premise dropped into a Steven Soderbergh movie. The two never gel.

Credit where it’s due, the camera work is confident, and the production design gives Kabul and Tehran real texture. The VFX, however, are a letdown, and the writing is the film’s weakest link.

The buddy-soldier camaraderie is the strongest part of the story. Quincy Isaiah, Wes Chatham, Jake Choi, Augusto Aguilera and Grant Harvey make Levi’s team feel like men who have bled together, and their banter carries more feeling than any of the scripted tragedy.

Neeson has the shortest role and leaves the biggest impression, but the character makes little sense, and no political reading rescues him. Corny dialogue and an over-the-top twist at the end push him into lampoon territory. Elnaaz Norouzi is the other standout, and she shows how badly Bollywood has underused her by never looking past her looks. Her final scene with Levi short-changes both her arc and her performance, another case of the director failing his actor. Levi is unlike anything he has done before, though he looks like a misfit whenever the film asks him to show inner turmoil.

Navid Negahban brings menace and lived-in weight to the Iranian side as Qasim. He deserves a sharper villain than the one the script hands him. The Fix has the firepower. It just lacks a story worth aiming it at.