Dwayne Johnson has confirmed filming is officially underway on his first Netflix exclusive movie, Red Notice. At a time when everyone from Martin Scorsese to Michael Bay is teaming up with the streaming service, it was inevitable one of the biggest stars on the planet right now would eventually find a project to work on for them. The Rock has teased a couple of potential collaborations with Netflix in the past, including a folklore-inspired action film titled John Henry and the Statesman. Up first, though, is Red Notice, an action-comedy Johnson has been working on since 2018.
Written and directed by Johnson’s Central Intelligence and Skyscraper collaborator Rawson Marshall Thurber, Red Notice reportedly follows an interpol agent as they try and track down the greatest art thief in the world. Universal acquired the film two years ago after nearly being outbid by Netflix and set it for a Fall 2020 release, but dropped the project after balking at Thurber’s proposed budget last summer. Netflix was quick to move in after that and snatched up Red Notice, attaching Ryan Reynolds to costar along the way.
Johnson took to Instagram to announce Red Notice has started shooting this morning, confirming Reynolds and Gal Gadot (who joined the film in July 2018) as his cast members in the process. You can check out his post in the space below.
Based on the previous reports about Red Notice, Johnson is portraying “The world’s greatest tracker” he mentioned in his Instagram update, with Gadot playing “The world’s greatest art thief"and Reynolds bringing “The world’s greatest conman” to life in the film. It makes sense enough; those roles also play to the actors’ respective strengths, with Johnson being known for his no-nonsense protagonists like Agent Luke Hobbs from the Fast & Furious movies, Gadot being an international superstar thanks to her performance as Wonder Woman, and Reynolds having long specialized in tackling sly comedic antiheroes like Deadpool. All three have already worked together on the Fast & Furious series (with Gadot starring opposite Johnson in Fast Five and Fast & Furious 6 and Reynolds making a surprise appearance in last year’s Hobbs & Shawspinoff), so their chemistry ought to be all the stronger in Red Notice for it.
Admittedly, neither of Johnson’s previous collaborations with Thurber are considered his best work, and it remains to be seen if Red Notice amounts to much more than a diverting genre movie featuring three big A-listers. Netflix typically focuses on broad appeal over quality when it comes to their non-awards season contenders, but it’s a strategy that’s paid off handsomely in terms of viewership, with Murder Mystery and 6 Underground (which Reynolds co-starred in) overcoming middling to negative reviews to become Netflix’s most-watched exclusive movies last year alone. Thanks to the lowered bar for admission, Red Notice should have little trouble becoming a similar success for Netflix when it arrives in (most likely) mid to late 2021, be the critical response on its side or not.
Source: Dwayne Johnson
