Argylle Review: Too Much Plot, Too Little Wow

Directed by Matthew Vaughn

Cast: Bryce Dallas Howard, Sam Rockwell, Henry Cavill, Catherine O'Hara, Bryan Cranston, Samuel L. Jackson, John Cena, Ariana DeBose, Dua Lipa.

Runtime: 139 min

Available in: Theatres

After having emerged from a dance move that is allegedly called “whirlybird” and  involves a strategic positioning of one’s head in line with one’s partner’s crotch, Agent Argylle (Henry Cavill), in a bespoke, velvet Nehru jacket, is chasing the villain LaGrange (Dua Lipa) through a coastal Greek town. She’s wearing a glittering golden dress that looks like it’s been painted on her. He’s got a square head of hair. He bursts through walls, breaks clotheslines, and drives between the roofs of homes — something even Ajay Devgn hasn’t done yet — while she expertly winds her way through the narrow lanes, only to eventually be yanked off her bike by Argylle’s hulking aesthete of a sidekick, Wyatt (John Cena).

Is Argylle (2024) going to be another reckless, violent, ridiculous and joyful film by director Matthew Vaughn, whose list of directorial credits include Layer Cake (2004), Kick-Ass (2010), X-Men: First Class (2011) and the Kingsmen films? Conventionally, one would argue three out of four is not a bad score, but unfortunately, while Argylle (2024) checks the boxes for reckless, violent and ridiculous, it is also the opposite of joyful. 

Plot Twist: It’s Awful

Elly Conway (Bryce Dallas Howard) is a celebrated author, known for her bestselling Argylle series, which has its hero the square-headed, square-jawed, square-shouldered Argylle. While basking in the glory of a well-attended reading, Elly is asked by a fan when the sequel will come out. “Sooner than you think,” says Elly coyly, thus clueing in the audience to just how removed from reality Argylle is because no author has ever stuck to deadline or worse, admitted to delivering before deadline. 

Yet it turns out this is among the more credible parts of Elly’s story. When she decides to take a train to visit her parents — she’s scared of flying — and finish the fifth Argyll at home with help from her mum (Catherine O’Hara), all hell breaks loose. An encounter with a hairy stranger named Aidan (Sam Rockwell) leads to Elly realising a lot of people want to kidnap or kill her because certain incidents in her novels are uncannily similar to the real business of a spy syndicate known as the Division. The Division has hacked Elly’s computer and it’s read her fifth book, which speaks of a “silver bullet” that has the details of double agents working for the Division. It turns out that this file actually exists and Aidan wants Elly to finish her book so that they can go and procure the aforementioned silver bullet. (Don’t look for logic. It isn’t there.) 

In high-octane action sequences that we expect from Vaughn’s films, Aiden valiantly battles to safeguard Elly's life while she keeps seeing visions of the protagonist of her espionage novels, the suave and charismatic Argylle. Sometimes, Argylle is Elly, finishing her sentences and appearing as her own reflection in the mirror. At other times, he fuses into Aidan when the latter takes on dozens of men. Aidan gets bruised and battered;  Argylle moves through villains and stunts with charm and finesse. These fleeting hallucinations aren’t enough to justify Cavill as Argylle occupying prime real estate on the film’s poster (Cena and Ariana deBose are also wasted in miniscule roles that get barely seconds of screen time), but that’s only one in a long list of problems in this film. 

Neither Spectacular Nor Memorable

It’s not every day that Hollywood produces a film that makes Abbas-Mustan’s cheerfully unhinged and twisty plots seem straightforward and logical, but Vaughn has achieved that feat with Argylle. (In fact, most of the stunts in Argylle could have done with some of Abbas-Mustan’s characteristically insane detailing.) With a cast of glossy stars and comedy legends, ranging from Cavill to O’Hara, Dallas Howard, Bryan Cranston and Samuel L. Jackson, we’re entitled to expect a comedy thriller that’s clever, tense and funny. Sure, there’s a resemblance with The Lost City (2022), in which author Loretta (Sandra Bullock) finds herself mixed up in a dangerous world when mad billionaire Abigail Fairfax (Daniel Radcliffe) discovers there are clues to hidden treasure in Loretta’s books. However, while being mostly ridiculous, The Lost City did make an effort to make sense. Argylle is all over the place and lacks both punchline and pacing. Too much time is spent on sequences that ultimately prove to be inconsequential to both plot and characterisation. Worse yet, barring two fight sequences in the film’s last chapter, the stunts are neither spectacular nor memorable. Some of the twists in Argylle do manage to surprise, but so little makes sense in the plot that the film feels more tiresome than exciting. Catherine O'Hara is the best part of this film, managing to inject a much-needed spark every time she is on screen. 

All this is disappointing because Dallas Howard and Rockwell deserve better. An author who has a dashing spy as her alter ego is a fun premise and we do get to glimpse how entertaining Dallas Howard can be as an action star, but she’s failed by Jason Fuchs’s screenplay, which keeps Elly cornered in the damsel-in-distress corner for too much of the film’s duration. Dallas Howard and Rockwell — another actor who deserved better — show sparks of chemistry, but their relationship and roles are too underwritten to be charming. The most self-aware and meta moments of the film involve Elly and Aidan, with Dallas Howard and Rockwell doing their best to make this bonkers premise believable. However, for much of Argylle, it feels like they are the only ones in on the joke. Between an awkwardly done CGI cat, a grape metaphor, and The Keeper of Secrets — who is supposed to “keep secrets”. That’s your cue to laugh. You’re welcome — what we get is a Möbius strip of a film that feels like an impersonation of a Vaughn film rather than the real thing.