Guy Ritchie built a career on the patter of London gangsters, and The Gentlemen brings him back to it. Matthew McConaughey plays Mickey Pearson, an American expat who built a marijuana empire on the estates of aristocratic landlords who needed cash. When word spreads that he wants to cash out, the scheming starts.
Trailer, via STXfilms.
A £400 Million Sale
Pearson plans to sell his empire to Matthew Berger, an American billionaire and cannabis baron, for £400 million. Berger is played by Jeremy Strong. Then Dry Eye, a Chinese gangster played by Henry Golding, offers to buy the business instead. Pearson turns him down.
Charlie Hunnam plays Ray, Pearson’s right-hand man. Hugh Grant plays Fletcher, a private detective hired by Daily Print tabloid editor Big Dave to investigate Pearson’s links to a landlord, Lord Pressfield.
“Criminal. Class.”
The Toddlers and Coach
The film’s best material comes from the margins. A crew of amateur MMA fighters and aspiring YouTubers called The Toddlers raid one of Pearson’s labs, overpower the guards, steal marijuana, and upload a rap video of the caper online.
Their trainer, Coach, played by Colin Farrell, orders them to delete the video. Farrell’s scenes are the film’s loosest. To this writer’s eye, The Toddlers are idiots, but they are the only characters who seem to be having fun.
What the Film Gets Wrong
The Gentlemen premiered at the Curzon Mayfair Cinema on December 3, 2019, and opened in UK cinemas on January 1, 2020, through Entertainment Film Distributors. STXfilms released it in the United States on January 24, 2020. Ritchie directed and produced it, and co-wrote it with Marn Davies and Ivan Atkinson.
The problem is that Ritchie mistakes volume for wit. The plot has too many moving parts, and the film keeps explaining them. Michelle Dockery plays Rosalind Pearson, Pearson’s wife, and the part asks little of her.
The film wants to be about class and criminality, but it settles for a series of setups. The Toddlers are a joke. The aristocrats are a joke. The gangsters are a joke. Nothing lands hard enough to matter.
Where the Money Goes
The Gentlemen is a reunion tour, not a new record. Ritchie has the cast and the energy, but the script never finds a reason to care about any of it.
It is a film that looks like a good time and feels like a long one. The £400 million sale is the engine of the plot, not its only stake.
Score: 5.1/10 (Metacritic 51/100)
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