Unlocked (2017)

(In French, On TV, September 2022) If you have seen Unlocked and forgot about it, don’t be too hard on yourself—in many, many, manyyy ways, it’s a variation on an incredibly familiar kind of thriller: a middling, murky London-set espionage caper featuring a heroine betrayed by friends and institutions. (See also: Milla Jovovich in Survivor, etc.)  Here, it’s Noomi Rapace (working steadily since her Millennium breakthrough roles, but somehow never becoming the A-lister she was often presented to be) as a disgraced agent who accidentally discovers a dangerous secret, and ends up hunted by friends and foes. It’s serviceable without being actually any good—while this was director Michael Apted’s last movie before his death in 2021, it’s not much of a closing statement. Apted’s name probably explains why such known names as Michael Douglas, John Malkovich, Toni Collette and Orlando Bloom fill out the cast—but his handling of B-grade thriller material is merely competent. Unlocked’s biggest problem remains the script, which regurgitates a parade line of clichés without much gusto—there’s a sense that whatever energy the film has is provided by the actors chewing into their roles. Thank goodness for John Malkovich hamming things up in his line delivery; otherwise the entire film would have been a much duller affair. The other highlights (Rapace shooting her way out of a hotel room where she’s supposed to be killed; Colette handling a machine gun) are slight, few and should have been in a much better film. Given all this, Unlocked amounts to a disappointing, and yet very familiar film—a B-grade thriller the likes of which you can watch while doing something else and not miss a single plot beat.