Coming seven years after the last, this fourth Men in Black outing is a lot more fun than you’ve heard but no less deprived of necessity or smarts. Beyond the all new ensemble and switched focal location, not so much has changed with the franchise, which once originated with the Malibu/Marvel comic book series of Lowell Cunningham. Inherent cast charisma is still vital in papering over the slacks and cracks that pester the series’ plots and characters, whilst inventive visuals remain valuable in maintaining basic aesthetic engagement. Here, a Phantom Menace tone pervades and Fate of the Furious director F. Gary Gray kind of gets away it.
From Michael Dowse, erstwhile director of The F Word, Stuber is more promising than it gives itself credit for. Aside from its likeable leads, the film boasts a bonafide decent conceit. This is the story of an Uber driver – Kumail Nanjiani’s Stu – who finds himself engulfed by the hunt for a slippery underworld drug lord when LAPD detective Vic Manning (Dave Bautista) hitches a ride. Sadly, an early wrong turn in the film’s navigation misses the opportunity. What follows is a trip over reliant on B roads and over extended by roundabouts. It is small mercy that Dowse’s passengers do, at least, seem committed to ensuring a fun ride.
Unlike the meticulously plotted Marvel Cinematic Universe, in which everything matters and all instalments work towards the established bigger picture, episodes in Warner Bros.’ Conjuring franchise are only ever as significant as the momentary pleasure they exude. Thus, the events of The Nun and The Curse of La Llorona bear no significance in Annabelle Comes Home, third in the porcelain sub series and seventh overall. Heck, even the previous two Annabelle films feel barely relevant with this one. An all too brief turn for Patrick Wilson and Vera Farmiga’s Ed and Lorraine Warren makes for a promising start but in their absence the film suffers a bad case of tonal confusion.
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