You can’t keep a good Vin Diesel franchise down, any more than you can keep a Vin Diesel character dead for longer than one movie. Reprising his role of Xander Cage from the 2002 film XXX, Diesel rises from the grave (okay, he says he just went into exile) to work for the government one more time. If you recall, Cage was an extreme sports dude recruited by Agent Augustus Gibbons (Samuel L. Jackson) to fight crime in ways the U.S. government wasn’t suited to, but it turns out Cage didn’t like the idea of working for The Man, so he went into hiding—sitting out the sequel, XXX: STATE OF THE UNION, starring Ice Cube)—while his XXX nickname became something of a designation for any anti-establishment warrior secretly working for the government.
Now back with XXX: RETURN OF XANDER CAGE, Cage is brought out of hiding when Gibbons is killed by a satellite that was literally plucked out of orbit and sent hurtling to the earth as a weapon using a lethal device known as Pandora’s Box. Gibbons’ replacement, Jane Marke (Toni Collette), locates Cage and convinces him to lead a team to find the skilled group of agents that stole the device. Rather than use military types, Cage puts together his own team of miscreants to seek out the box and presumably mess up the group that has it. All given XXX status, Cage's team includes Ruby Rose (“Orange Is the New Black”), Chinese star Kris Wu, and Rory McCann (The Hound from “Game of Thrones”), with tech support suppled by Nina Dobrev (“The Vampire Diaries”). But the team they are facing is formidable, with the likes of Hong Kong action legend Donnie Yen (ROGUE ONE), Thai martial arts wizard Tony Jaa (ONG-BAK), and Indian actress Deepika Padukone.
The ins and outs of the plot don’t really matter because RETURN OF XANDER CAGE isn’t about story at all, unless is involves shooting, explosions, martial arts, one-liners, catchphrases and uncomfortably aggressive flirting. Seriously, there are few things on screen that disturb me more than watching Vin Diesel clunk his way through sexy talk with women who seem placed on the screen for the sole purpose of him invading their personal space. The only thing more upsetting is watching the actresses pretend to enjoy it.
Director D.J. Caruso (EAGLE EYE, DISTURBIA, I AM NUMBER FOUR) keeps things moving at a breakneck speed, and I guess that’s a good thing because if I’d been given more than five seconds to think about how stupid what I was seeing was, I might have punched the screen.
The mission of the film (and it’s even stated at the end of the movie) is for these characters to look as cool as possible committing as many acts of violence as possible in a PG-13 movie, and if that—punctuated by dumb jokes—is all you care about, then you’ll be a happy idiot. I have nothing against violent movies; quite the contrary. But after a while, your eyes blur, you mind numbs and your ears ring, and you begin to tune out for a little relief. Even the Fast & Furious films found a way to meet us in the middle by making us care about its characters. I didn’t care who lived or died in RETURN OF XANDER CAGE, and that makes a big difference when considering giving your brain over to a brainless movie.
This may branch into spoiler territory, but since he’s featured in the latest TV commercials for the film, I’m going to talk about it. Ice Cube’s Darius Stone (from the second XXX film) does make an appearance here, and with the exception of one shared moment with Diesel, it’s entirely possible that he shot his scenes separately from the rest of the cast, even though he’s supposed to be saving their collective asses. It’s so noticeable, it feels like including him was an afterthought. But Diesel doesn’t like loose ends in his movies, so there’s Darius, armed with a grenade launcher, a theme song and a mean face.
I have a feeling you already know if you want to see this or not, and if you do, don’t let me dissuade you. The action sequences are sometimes breathtaking; other times they are confusing, blurry and sloppy in their staging. I know most people put aside the usual things you look for in a quality film and just go with it, but it’s the films that don’t ask us to do that and still manage to entertain fully that I love the most. XXX: RETURN OF XANDER CAGE is not such a film.
