Free Fire Review: Boring Tarantino Knock-off

Free Fire reduces the elements of a shoot’em up action movie into its simplest form. A bunch of criminals meets at a secret warehouse to buy guns. The deal goes wrong and everyone is locked in a Mexican standoff – no CGI, bullet “ballets” and fight choreography.

The cast is filled with a talented and interesting mix of actors, including Cillian Murphy, Army Hammer, Brie Larson, Sharlto Copley, and Jack Reynor. The rest are British character actors that you’ve probably seen somewhere.

It’s obvious that the cast here is having fun which makes their characters watchable even with a simplistic narrative. However, as the plot progresses, things eventually get monotonous and pointless.

Free Fire wants the viewers to revel in its irreverent approach but doesn’t offer anything memorable. The one-line zingers fall flat. The gunfight is silly and protracted. The characters are disposable.

The movie climaxes with a ridiculous scene and ends on a cliffhanger. That’s if you haven’t lost interest in a bunch of people who are crawling around and trying not to get shot.

The result is a self-satisfied forgettable mediocre movie that falls short of being a satire. If there’s one thing that can be derived from Free Fire though, is that guns don’t kill people. It’s people who refuse to put down their guns even when it’s perfectly reasonable.