Gringo

For­mer stunt­man turned direc­tor Nash Edgerton’s Mex­i­can-set com­e­dy is packed with impres­sive action, wit­ty one lin­ers and cheap stereo­types. Nice guy Niger­ian-Amer­i­can busi­ness­man Harold Soyin­ka (David Oyelowo) winds up in trou­ble south of the bor­der after being back­stabbed by ruth­less phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal heads Elaine Markin­son (Char­l­ize Theron) and Richard Rusk (Joel Edgerton).

Amid the chaos and awk­ward mishaps our unfor­tu­nate hero encoun­ters ex-mer­ce­nary Mitch (Sharl­to Cop­ley) as well as two rather clue­less twen­tysome­thing tourists (Aman­da Seyfried and Har­ry Tread­away). Unfor­tu­nate­ly, the vibrant coun­try of Mex­i­co serves only as an exot­ic back­drop for this cliched crime caper.

This is a some­what sur­pris­ing star vehi­cle con­sid­er­ing the lack of char­ac­ter devel­op­ment. The por­tray­al of women is par­tic­u­lar­ly prob­lem­at­ic thanks to a one-dimen­sion­al and lazi­ly misog­y­nis­tic plot. Thandie New­ton, play­ing Harold’s wife, Bon­nie, is thrown in in an attempt to fur­ther a tedious sub­plot and to make Harold’s life hell.

Else­where Theron’s Elaine is a humour­less ​‘cold bitch’ arche­type who uses her sex­u­al­i­ty to her advan­tage, while Seyfried remains sweet and inno­cent through­out, obliv­i­ous to her boyfriend’s ulte­ri­or motive. Though the film falls flat in places, watch­ing Edger­ton and Theron’s moral­ly bank­rupt cor­po­rate bad­dies suf­fer does give it a slight lift.

It is worth not­ing Oyelowo’s per­for­mance as he just about holds the film togeth­er as the like­able but down-on-his-luck uncle with a good heart. Harold’s vis­i­ble anger and dis­may dur­ing a heat­ed debate over whether to raid a hotel mini bar is a high­light. As the film draws to a close, every loose end is neat­ly tied up – come­up­pance looms over those who deserve it, yet still we scarce­ly root for Harold to live the life he always knew was a lie.