In this G20 movie review we’re discussing an action-thriller with the makings of a geopolitical Die Hard, director Patricia Riggen places Oscar-winner Viola Davis front and center as a U.S. president forced to return to her military roots when terrorists seize control of a high-stakes international summit. Despite a timely premise and a cast packed with talent, the film delivers more formula than firepower. With a heavy-handed script, clunky dialogue, and uneven pacing, G20 ultimately squanders its potential, becoming a middling genre entry that leans too hard on tropes without earning the tension they require.

Setup:

The setup is undeniably bold. President Danielle Sutton (Viola Davis) is not only a decorated military veteran but also a sitting head of state caught in a brutal siege during a G20 summit in Cape Town. When a team of mercenaries, led by the villainous Edward Rutledge (Antony Starr), storms the venue, Sutton must rely on her combat training to protect world leaders, her own family, and the fragile balance of global power.

At the center of this storm is Davis, whose gravitas anchors the film, elevating even its most clichéd scenes. Whether she’s staring down the barrel of a gun or delivering a rousing speech about economic equity, Davis embodies a woman balancing ferocity with diplomacy. Her physical performance is as convincing as her emotional range, and her presence keeps G20 from tipping into straight-to-streaming mediocrity. However, even her excellence can’t overcome a screenplay that feels overstuffed and underdeveloped.

A Weak Script:

Writers Caitlin Parrish, Erica Weiss, and the Miller brothers load the script with topical concerns – cryptocurrency, global corruption, economic inequality, and misinformation via deepfakes — but these themes are explored at a surface level. Rather than diving into the nuance of any one issue, the film uses them as window dressing to justify action beats. The result is a patchwork of modern anxieties filtered through genre spectacle, with little room to breathe.

The action sequences are competent but rarely inventive. There’s a utilitarian feel to the choreography, guns blaze, bodies fall, and Viola Davis dispatches villains with brute efficiency — but there’s little in the way of standout set pieces. A late-film helicopter showdown hints at the scale and operatic intensity the movie could have embraced throughout, but by then, fatigue has already set in.

The pacing is uneven, bouncing from family drama to global diplomacy to firefights without a strong tonal throughline. The first act is bogged down by exposition and thin character development, particularly regarding Sutton’s children Serena (Marsai Martin) and Demetrius (Christopher Farrar), and her husband Derek (Anthony Anderson). While the First Family adds stakes, their dynamic feels more sketched than lived-in.

Supporting Actors That Feel Underused:

Antony Starr, best known for The Boys, plays Rutledge with intensity, but the character feels disappointingly one-dimensional. His cyber-terrorism, rooted in betrayal and grief, could have been compelling, but the film reduces it to high-tech MacGuffins.

Supporting players like Ramón Rodríguez (Agent Manny Ruiz) and Elizabeth Marvel (Treasury Secretary Joanna Worth) are competent but underused. The ensemble, including Clark Gregg, Sabrina Impacciatore, and Douglas Hodge, are mostly sidelined as hostages or background chatter.

Lackluster Direction:

Riggen, known for The 33, directs with competence but without flair. The cinematography is flat, and the hotel setting lacks personality. Attempts to show global urgency via media cutaways fall flat. The score offers pounding drums and swelling strings—but adds little emotion or tension.

Viola Davis is the Standout:

Viola Davis is the reason to watch G20. She delivers gravitas, physicality, and poise that elevate the material. Her performance makes the absurd seem possible, at least for a moment. Unfortunately, the rest of the film rarely rises to meet her level.

Thematically, G20 wants to say something about technology, leadership, and trust. But with thin characters and scattered execution, it says little of lasting value.

Overall:

G20 feels like a missed opportunity. With Viola Davis in the lead and a globally relevant premise, it had the chance to be something great. Instead, it’s a generic action-thriller with a few highlights and a lot of wasted potential. G20 has the bones of a smart political action-thriller, and Viola Davis gives it everything she’s got. But clunky writing and flat direction hold it back from greatness. It’s worth a watch for fans of Air Force One or The Woman King, but temper your expectations.

4/5 stars

Part reboot, part sequel, Bullet Train Explosion revisits the nail-biting scenario of a high-speed train that will explode if its speed drops below 100 miles per hour (161km/h).

Combining state-of-the-art visual effects with unprecedented access to real Shinkansen trains and facilities from the East Japan Railway (JR East) Company, Higuchi delivers an epic action thrill-ride every bit as exhilarating as its predecessor.

Tsuyoshi Kusanagi reunites with the director for the first time since Sinking of Japan (2006) to headline an ensemble cast. He plays Takaichi, senior conductor of the Tohoku Shinkansen Hayabusa No. 60 on its perilous journey across Honshu island towards Tokyo.

The premise

A serial killer who’s killing elderly men and then stuffing the state’s famed Poovan banana in their mouth is causing havoc in Kerala. Dubbed the ‘Banana Killer’, he has created fear among people, and the villagers of Vallikkunnu are no exception. The movie reveals early on who the killer is and why he is hell-bent on murdering old men (childhood trauma), and how he finds his victims. Now, while the police are searching for the Banana Killer, another man is creating a major nuisance in the village itself – Luke PP (Basil Joseph), the hero of this film. The police arrest him believing he is the serial killer, but unfortunately for them, he’s not.

Proudly branding himself a sigma male, Luke is a new-age YouTuber cum influencer who goes out of his way to expose people’s dirty secrets with not a malicious intention but to clean up society. If he pulled out the porn search details of the panchayat head and plastered it in the village, he also placed the local police station up for sale on OLX as he didn’t find the cops doing their work. Fed up with his antics, the entire village pools in a sum of ₹16 lakhs to send him packing to Czechoslovakia to get rid of him. The last straw for Luke is when Luke’s girlfriend Jessie (Anishma Anilkumar) breaks up with him because of his inability to take life seriously. Luke is all set to win her back somehow when a bus journey Jessie is on adds a major twist to the story. One night, Jessie heads back and finds herself on the bus with Luke, Jikku (driver), Aruvi (bus conductor), an elderly man, and a stranger. And it is this bus ride they are on that the entire story unfolds.

What works for Maranamass

In recent times, Basil Joseph has been striving to push himself out of his comfort zone (think Ponman, Praavinkoodu Shappu, Nunnakuzhi) and get into the skin of really offbeat characters. Luke PP is one of those roles that uses Basil Joseph’s ability to pull off comedy and adds the Gen Z Sigma male who struggles to pull it off despite his flashy clothes, blonde hair, and faded haircut.

Basil has pulled off Luke in style, but it has been ably aided by the other actors, namely Rajesh Madhavan, Suresh Krishna, Siju Sunny, Babu Antony, and Anishma Anilkumar. Each of them has delivered a truly note-worthy performance and the on-screen chemistry between the scenes lights up even when the dialogues don’t.

In Maranamass, debutant Sivaprasad, who has co-written the film with Siju Sunny, gives us a dark comedy centred around Luke. Most of the comedy in the film, though, is of a slapstick nature and often situational, with heavy pop culture references to elicit laughs. In one instance, the trend of pre-wedding photoshoots is spoofed with a ‘save the date’ photoshoot at a graveyard, and in another, a cop is called Tiger sir because he carries around a Tiger balm in his hand. You get the drift by now. Not all these scenes want to make you laugh and this is due to the inconsistencies in the screenplay that the second half lags.

Each of the key characters has been given interesting quirks to keep alive the narrative, which hits speed breaks ever so often, like the bus journey that Luke and Jessie are on. Produced by Tovino Thomas, Maranamass is, for the most part, an enjoyable, fun ride that’s filled with mayhem.