WOLFS – Review

Brad Pitt and George Clooney team up as a couple of lone wolf professional “fixers” for clients who need a messy crime or accident scene cleaned up. When a district attorney (Amy Ryan) checks into a posh hotel with a young man she picked up in the bar, but then finds herself in a fix when he is accidentally killed after a fall through a glass table. Panicked, she calls a number she got from someone, for a professional fixer (George Clooney) to clean it up. Unbeknownst to her, the hotel has illegal surveillance cameras, and the hotel’s owner, determined to protect the place’s reputation, puts in her own call to another professional fixer (Brad Pitt). Both men only work solo and so are outraged that their two employers want them to work together to clean things up, saving both the DA’s and the hotel’s reputations. The professionals now have to figure out how work together to get the job done so they both get paid.

And survive the night, when the unexpected happens. It turns out the kid (Austin Abrams) in the hotel room isn’t quite dead yet after all, and it all gets very complicated in writer/director Jon Watts’ double-star action crime thriller, served up with a nice side of dark comedy.

Pitt’s and Clooney’s nameless characters start out as adversaries but both are forced to work together as complications pile up. Pitt and Clooney make a good team, and they are fun and funny together. There is plenty of snappy patter and a few wisecracks as this pair of characters, who both think they are the best and keep trying to top each other, find they have to stop polishing their own egos and get the job done.

As things get increasingly crazy, absurd even, there are twists, chases, and plenty of action. The action sequences feature quick editing and fine photography, with dashes of humor, sometimes aimed at the aging Clooney and Pitt, who occasionally huff and puff, out of breath, in chases, or winch in pain as one bends down to hoist a body. The action sequences are first rate and clever, particularly a long chase through snowy NY night time streets, in pursuit of a guy in his tighty-whities. There is a hilarious one at an Albanian wedding reception they crash, including Pitt and Clooney caught up in a folk dance. Plenty more wild, unexpected twists and crazy circumstances pop up, the more improbable the better.

For those who like action thrillers, particularly with a dark humor slant, WOLFS is great fun. There is a smattering of little movie references, with a bit of SOME LIKE IT HOT and BUTCH AND THE SUNDANCE KID among them. Sure, it’s just entertainment but entertain WOLFS surely does, with Pitt and Clooney, who make the most of every scene, giving a good boost to the absurd plot. It is pure fun to watch these two work together, and it sparks a hope to see them paired up again, in this or some other format.

WOLFS debuts streaming on Apple+ TV on Friday, Sept. 27, after opening in theaters on Sept. 20.

RATING: 3 out of 4 stars