What’s It About

It follows a group of childhood friends who reunite when their old group leader, an undercover CIA agent played by John Cena, returns. They get pulled into a wild, global chase to stop a world disaster and save the day.

MOVIESinMO REVIEW

What’s the deal with Matchbox getting a movie? Barbie earned millions for Mattel in 2023, prompting someone to claw through the toy chest for the next cash cow. There are better toy properties out there than Matchbox; they have everything from Monster High to Polly Pocket to Power Wheels to Little People. Barbie dominates culture. Matchbox cars don’t talk. They don’t have unique personalities comparable to Transformers, nor do they possess the souls that come with Pixar’s Cars. All they do is sit on the shelf looking shiny. So, I went into Matchbox with very low expectations. What I saw was a movie that’s actually kinda fun. Not great. Not life-changing. But fun. Director Sam Hargrave and writer David Coggeshall kick things off in a small Ohio town in 1998. Five middle schoolers who call themselves the Matchbox Gang spend their days racing toy cars, trucks, planes, and helicopters in the garage of Mr. Smalley (Bill Camp), the neighborhood mechanic. Smalley is that one grown-up every kid needs, the kind who makes you feel safe and seen. He also handles the backstory, including how Matchbox cars got invented, without making you reach for your phone. Young Sean has a crush on Aimee and is about to hand her the toy she’s been dreaming about, a blue Limited Edition Super Camaro. Then he freezes up. Then his family moves to Chicago. Just like that, it’s over. Hargrave smash-cuts from that little blue car to a real one flipping end over end through the desert, 28 years later. Grown-up Sean (John Cena) is behind the wheel, dodging bullets while bickering on the phone with his CIA handler, Helen (Danai Gurira). He’s hauling a stolen nuclear warhead from one bad guy to trade to another. Job done, Helen tells him to lay low. Then a funeral drags him home to Ohio, where the old crew is waiting, and each of them grew up into a full-size version of their favorite toy. Ted (Arturo Castro) teaches high school science and is raising three kids with his husband. Crosby (Sam Richardson) runs heavy machinery and never lets go of his Leatherman. His wife, Charmaine (Teyonah Parris), flies the traffic helicopter. Aimee (Jessica Biel) drives an ambulance during the week and races on weekends with Matchbox as her sponsor. You already know every one of those skills is coming back around. Act One of the reunion film features a lot of over-familiar and stereotypical happenings. The reunion barely starts when everybody gets drugged and finds themselves on a plane, while a person tortures Sean. The plot takes off from there, covering the same old ground: forgotten friends remembering they love each other, the workaholic realizing that he has been missing something, and the couch potatoes rediscovering their craving for adventure. There’s a betrayal that you can smell from miles away, a chase scene through the crowded market because it’s obligatory, and the team suddenly showing up in tuxedos as if there was a tailor hidden in the trunk. But then the stunts kick in, and the stunts cook. Before Hargrave ever sat in the director’s chair, he coordinated stunts on the Avengers movies, and later he directed both Extraction films. It shows. Box trucks scream through chases with their back doors flapping open. People catch fire. Sean slides backward down a staircase, firing guns to push himself along. He leaps off a building holding a fire hose and tucks himself under a speeding truck. Hargrave shot a lot of this for real, on real streets, with real cars slamming into each other, and you can feel the difference. It’s easier to follow and way more exciting than anything painted in front of a green screen. Cinematographer Pedro Luque and editor Dirk Westervelt keep every hit clear, and since Cena handles plenty of his own fights, the camera never has to hide anybody’s face. None of it is realistic, but it never goes full Fast & Furious cartoon physics either. I’ll take that trade any day. The real reason why I stayed with the characters is the actors. They really feel like people who have known each other for years. The writer only gives each actor one trait and one childhood boo-boo, but the performance makes it complete. Richardson and Castro are the people to crack all the jokes while Biel and Parris steady things down. It’s nice to see Ted’s family treated normally rather than as a source of laughter, and I like the fact that Parris discovered a good skill that actually matters in the story instead of relying on her husband. I wish Gurira was also given the same opportunity. She has been playing generals before, but here she mostly acts on the other side of the phone, figuring out what is needed. Golshifteh Farahani comes as a seller, Camp is good as usual, and Corey Stoll plays a loyal guy (I can say just that). The dialogues are not impressive, but everyone realizes what they have to do. Now the bad part. The movie’s two-hour-and-six-minute length is excessive considering that the story is so weak. As a result, the final act is boring. There is nothing here that reaches the level of Extraction, and I was not excited to rewind and watch anything again. Furthermore, the movie has that boring and dull look that characterizes all Apple movies. One should not enter the theater thinking they will see something similar to Barbie. That movie made an actual point about the world out of a doll, which will not happen with toy cars. Nevertheless, at least connecting the name with the car’s ability to keep friends together serves the purpose of putting it in the advertisement. My main fear is that Matchbox does not have the same recognition among people.

OUR RATING – A STUNT HEAVY 6