Though it may seem a strange thing to brag about, one thing I am proud to be known by is my Faith.  If there is a feature about me that people initially point to, it is that I am a Catholic.  There are others, like the fact that I am from Chicago.  Finally, people understand that I am a film buff, particularly those who also follow The Legionnaire.  These all came together today when Isaac, my friend and collaborator with Oh Man Disney (which you can find on TikTok and YouTube), called me today to talk about the election of Pope Leo XIV.  He is not the only one to contact me for a reaction to this news since he is the first American born prelate, and he comes from Chicago.  Before we got too deep in conversation, he remembered a key feature of my Thursday evenings: going to the cinema.  His final question was to ask what I was seeing and I balked, not remembering the title.  It was Shadow Force, which sounds like a 1980s action flick, but turned out to be justifiably forgettable.  After reading the rest of this review, tell me if any of this sounds familiar.

There is little familiar about the beginning of Shadow Force, though there are a lot of the first word in the title.  From a dimly lit hotel room somewhere in Miami, Florida, Kyrah Owens (Kerry Washington), shoots and kills . . . someone.  We then cut to a different part of the Florida metropolis where Isaac Sarr (Omar Sy) is giving a bath to his four-year-old son, Ky Sarr (Jahleel Kamara).  As they make it through the nighttime ablutions, the boy asks his father to retell the story of his mother, who is evidently Kyrah.  If it is not evident at this point, then a flashback soon after clinches it, also revealing why she is away from them.  Her absence is due to “bad guys,” as Ky understands the situation, wanting to see them dead, and Kyrah making sure that does not happen.  Then again, as we shortly witness, Isaac is plenty capable of handling himself.  The next day while father and son go to the bank, they happen to be there in the middle of an attempted armed robbery.  When one of the gunmen points a weapon at Ky, Isaac tells his son to close his eyes and cover his ears.  Upon reopening them, Isaac is kneeling in front of Ky having eliminated all the criminals, and they leave before the police arrive.  The incredible footage of Isaac’s actions is shown on the evening news, and word of this gets to Jack Cinder (Mark Strong).  This former member of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) had created the title team, a group of elite assassins that could do what was annoyingly described (to this Catholic) as “God’s dirty work.”  Sigh.  Isaac and Kyrah had once been a part of the Shadow Force, and loyalty to it is something that Jack had made them all swear.  He labels Isaac and Kyrah’s relationship essentially as a forbidden, interoffice romance, using it as justification to go after the two of them once Isaac resurfaces with his bank lobby heroics.  Jack puts a bounty on their heads worth several million dollars, but then calls in the remaining members of Shadow Forced not assassinated by Kyrah to take out the two rebels.  I guess they will split the reward five ways?  Either way, Isaac is not sitting around to find out how this will work, taking Ky to a safe house in the jungles of Colombia.  The only other person who is aware of this location is Ky, and she finds Isaac and her son at this out-of-the-way spot.  There is a tense moment as she is angry with Isaac for ruining his cover, but being reintroduced to her Ky helps calm the situation.  Meanwhile, there are two other people who are tracking Jack’s illicit activity, and who seem to be in on what is happening with Isaac and Kyrah.  They are Auntie Clanter (Da’Vine Joy Randolph) and Marcus “Unc” Owens (Cliff “Method Man” Smith), and they are able to somehow figure out Isaac and Kyrah’s movements.  So, too, can Jack and his henchmen because they catch up with our main characters as they leave their safe house in an armored car.  There is a firefight as they go down the road, ending with their heavily modified muscle car rolling over a cliff and landing in the water.  As happens often in this movie, the three are able to make it back to shore miraculously unharmed.  In the morning, Kyrah calls Jack and arranges a private meeting, hoping to save Isaac and Ky from being targeted.  Jack accepts because he has always had a thing for Kyrah, but her double-crossing fails when she shoots him in the chest and he is prepared with a bulletproof vest.  Meanwhile, Isaac turns to Auntie and Unc for help, though Unc has been secretly working for Jack, and brings father and son to Jack’s private island.  Things are looking bleak until two of Jack’s assistants reveal themselves to be federal agents there to arrest Jack and put an end to his clandestine work.  From here, it is the expected action nonsense, ending with a boat chase on the mainland and Jack crashing a wedding reception, literally and figuratively.  The long and short of this is that Isaac and Kyrah are able to be a family, and six months later they are living in suburbia, throwing a birthday party for Ky.  In the last scene, Auntie, now working for the CIA, tries to recruit her friends, but Kyrah declines, evidently expecting another baby.

What Auntie is trying to get Isaac and Kyrah to agree to is to form a new Shadow Force.  However, they are more interested for the moment in continuing their family.  It is an odd thing for a devoted Catholic like myself to say, but I am getting tired of that word “family.”  Please know I mean this strictly in a cinematic sense.  Family is something that is part of the fabric of what it means to be Christian.  There is the Holy Family; we are adopted daughters and sons of God through Jesus; us Catholics refer to our clergy as “Father;” and members of religious communities as “brothers” and “sisters.”  I could go on but I think you get the point.  When I hear it in a movie, it comes off as contrived.  I blame the Fast and Furious saga for this attitude of mine.  Of course, the term does not have to refer solely to a mother, father, and children, though that is the Christian ideal.  It is that the franchise famous for everything cars made a mockery of it by basing it on the loosest of bonds, and placing pressure on those connections to do tasks of questionable morality.  Finally, simply repeating the term does not add any emotional depth.  While Shadow Force is tamer by comparison, it attempts to lend weight to this idea while never following through with it.  Before the movie begins, there is a quote by the late psychologist Paul Pearsall that reads: “Our most basic instinct is not for survival but family.”  Any Christian would agree with this sentiment, but for our film’s purposes, it is supposed to set up a theme for the rest of the proceedings.  I think Isaac and Kyrah are willing to lay down their lives for Ky, but we never see those stakes truly tested.

What Shadow Force did test was my patience.  As it kept hitting the familiar action beats, it got more predictable and less entertaining.  Hence, it does not leave me with much more to say as is my wont with new releases.  I guess if there is anything else to discuss, it is Isaac and Kyrah’s explanation to Ky about the nature of their work.  One can argue that these two odd parents deserve credit for telling their son the truth.  As children often do, Ky also asks hard questions.  The kid is a good example of accepting the Kingdom of God as a child.  To the young, love is simple.  As adults, we tend to put conditions on our feelings, including with God.  Nonetheless, Ky wonders aloud whether his dad and mom are bad guys.  The question comes from a place of innocence.  To the boy, villains are the ones that want to do harm to others.  At the same time, Isaac does not hide the fact that this is something he used to do.  In explaining it to Ky, Isaac says that he and Ky’s mom once believe they were on the good side.  When they realized this was not the case, they decided to change their lives.  There is value in applying this lesson to our own lives.  No matter how much bad we think we have done, God always accepts us back immediately.  What it takes is true contrition on our part, and us Catholics also have the Sacrament of Reconciliation.  Unfortunately, neither Isaac or Ky seem to have learned their lesson.  Although they turn down Auntie’ offer in the end, they leave it open for after the second child is born.

What that ending also implies is that there could be a sequel to Shadow Force.  There is nothing about this film that warrants a follow up, and the rest is inexplicable.  Had it shown something unique, then maybe it would change my mind.  Otherwise, pass.