In the Grey review – Guy Ritchie’s bizarrely buried action caper is a blast

W hile the actual quality might never threaten to float him above a three-star rating, I’ve grown an odd, outsized fondness for Guy Ritchie’s recent run of solidly enjoyable lower-tier action films. Whether deadly serious ( Wrath of Man ), entirely unserious ( Operation Fortune ) or somewhere between the two ( The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare ), there’s been a real snap to them, one that’s usually missing from other recent films of that ilk. Ritchie is more deeply invested in the thought-th

If only audiences, and the companies releasing them, felt the same. While Wrath of Man, a more marketable Jason Statham revenge thriller yet containing more grit than one would expect, managed to make enough money overseas, he’s otherwise struggled to justify his unusually high budgets. Operation Fortune was renamed, resold and pushed around the schedule before misfiring at the box office (it went straight-to-streaming in many countries) while The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare couldn’t even make half of its budget back after another botched release. The trend may well continue with his latest In the Grey, another slick action thriller that was made back in 2023, bought and then sold by Lionsgate before being similarly redated three times, the film now heading for an underwhelming opening weekend (In the Red would be perhaps more appropriate). What’s strangest here is that even critics were kept away this time with no press screenings (I paid for a ticket), suggesting that even those reliable three stars might be out of reach for this one. But, against all considerable odds, In the Grey might well be Ritchie’s most purely entertaining film for years. Sure, it’s messy in moments (one can feel the long nights in the editing suite especially near the end) and nonsensically plotted at others, but it’s also an incredibly, consistently fun time. Ritchie allows both his cast and audience to let loose without allowing himself to lose his grip on the steering wheel, a safe pair of hands at a time when action has been dominated by those who don’t seem to know what they’re doing. He also avoids too much of the smug, “well that just happened” humour that’s corrupted so many other films of this cursed era and I was surprised by how seriously much of it is taken, not quite Wrath of Man serious, but enough to show what’s at stake and why we should care, life-or-death set pieces mercifully devoid of glib quips. His distributor might once again not be all that invested, but Ritchie definitely is. It’s his first sole writing credit since 2019’s The Gentleman and hinges on a nifty, unusual premise. Rachel (Eiza González, reteaming with Ritchie after Ministry) is a lawyer tasked with trying to retrieve unpaid debts from dangerous figures, working on behalf of similarly shadowy financial firms.

Key points

• If only audiences, and the companies releasing them, felt the same.
• While Wrath of Man, a more marketable Jason Statham revenge thriller yet containing more grit than one would expect, managed to make enough money overseas, he’s otherwise struggled to justify his u…
• Operation Fortune was renamed, resold and pushed around the schedule before misfiring at the box office (it went straight-to-streaming in many countries) while The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare…
• The trend may well continue with his latest In the Grey, another slick action thriller that was made back in 2023, bought and then sold by Lionsgate before being similarly redated three times, the…
• What’s strangest here is that even critics were kept away this time with no press screenings (I paid for a ticket), suggesting that even those reliable three stars might be out of reach for this one.