action, Cliff Smith, Colombia, Da'Vine Joy Randolph, Ed Quinn, Jahleel Kamara, Jenel Stevens-Thompson, Joe Carnahan, Kerry Washington, Mark Strong, Marshall Cook, Marvin Jones III, Method Man, movies, Natalia Reyes, Omar Sy, reviews, Sala Baker, Shadow Force, Yoson An
May 9, 2025
by Carla Hay
Directed by Joe Carnahan
Some language in French and German with subtitles
Culture Representation: Taking place in Colombia (and briefly in the United States, Mexico, and Spain), the action film “Shadow Force” features a racially diverse cast of characters (black, white, Asian and Latin) representing the working-class, middle-class and wealthy.
Culture Clash: Two married former mercenaries, who used to work for a U.S. government special operations group called Shadow Force, reunite after spending about five years apart, in order to take down the Shadow Force’s former members and leader, who want to kill the spouses for leaving Shadow Force.
Culture Audience: “Shadow Force” will appeal primarily to people who are fans of the movie’s headliners and stupid action movies that have famous cast members.
That sound you might hear when watching “Shadow Force” is the groan of disappointment that so many talented stars signed up for this awful action flick about two former mercenaries who drag their adorable 5-year-old son into their mess. Lionel Richie’s 1982 hit “Truly” is used as a running joke about sentimentality in the movie. The only “truly” description that applies to this train-wreck film is anything to do with how truly mind-boggling that this level of talent ended up in such low-quality junk.
Directed by Joe Carnahan, “Shadow Force” was written by Leon Chills and Carnahan. The movie takes place mostly in Colombia (where “Shadow Force” was filmed on location), with some scenes taking place briefly in the United States, Mexico, and Spain. Emmy-winning producer Kerry Washington is one of the producers of “Shadow Force,” which unfortunately is a bad investment for her. Her interest in doing this movie seems to be that she wants to showcase that she’s got what it takes to be an action movie star, after being known for mostly starring in dramas and comedies in her career. Washington puts in a good effort when expressing emotions in “Shadow Force,” but she should have chosen a better project, because “Shadow Force” is so horrendous, it’s an embarrassment to everyone involved.
The idiocy in “Shadow Force” begins within the first 10 minutes of the film. Isaac Sarr (played by Omar Sy) is driving to a bank in Miami with his 5-year-old son Ky Sarr (played by Jahleel Kamara), who is a big fan of Lionel Richie’s music. Isaac has been raising Ky as a single parent since Ky was a baby. And where is Ky’s mother, who is still married to Isaac? That information is eventually revealed in the movie.
Isaac and Ky have the misfortune of arriving at the bank just a few minutes before a gang of about 10 armed robbers storm inside and take everyone hostage. One of the robbers holds a gun to Ky’s head. Isaac wears hearing aids, but when he’s about to get in a major brawl, he takes out his hearing aids because he says the reduced noise helps him focus better on the fight. All it looks like is what Tyler Perry as Medea might do when she takes off her earrings before getting into a throwdown.
Isaac tells Ky to close his eyes. Things swirl on the screen and then fade to black. When Isaac tells Ky to open his eyes, Ky sees that all the bank robbers are dead because Isaac killed them all by himself. “Daddy got the bad guys,” Isaac proudly tells Ky. Yes, the movie really is this stupid. It’s also an example of lazy filmmaking to skip over what could have been an intense (although unrealistic) action scene. Isaac and Ky quickly leave the bank before police arrive.
In his rush to be a superhero vigilante, Isaac seems to have forgotten that everything he did in the bank was caught on surveillance video. When you find out that Isaac is supposed to be in hiding, his reckless actions make him look like a moron. This bank robbery massacre makes the news, of course. Jack Cinder, a high-level spy for the U.S. government, sees the surveillance video and immediately recognizes Isaac because he’s been looking for Isaac for the past five years.
And when Jack Cinder sees that Isaac has a son, Jack mutters aloud this realization: “Kyrah got pregnant.” Who is Kyrah? (Her name is pronounced “kye-rah.”) She is Kyrah Owens (played by Washington), who is Ky’s mother and Isaac’s estranged wife. When Ky was a baby, Kyrah left them to go into hiding for Ky’s safety because she thinks the people who want to kill them will assume that she wouldn’t leave Ky.
Why is this family in hiding? In one of the movie’s many exposition dumps, Jack hastily explains to two flunkies named Patrick (played by Marshall Cook) and Parker (played by Ed Quinn) that Jack used to be the leader of a special operations group of mercenaries called Shadow Force. Jack says about Shadow Force: “Basically, we did God’s work around the globe.” Isaac and Kyra were members of Shadow Force, but they broke two of the biggest rules of the group: (1) Don’t get romantically involved with each other and (2) Don’t ever leave the group.
Isaac and Kyra fell in love with each other and went absent without leave around the time that she found out that she was pregnant. They went into hiding and at some point got married. The movie’s main flashback to their early life on the run (before they separated) was when Ky was a baby, and Kyrah told Isaac that she made the difficult decision to go away for Ky’s safety. Kyrah promised that she would eventually return. But after five years of having no contact with Kyrah, Isaac assumed that she wasn’t coming back. Ky was told that Kyrah was “away,” and it was unknown when she would return.
Jack wants revenge because when Isaac and Kyrah quit Shadow Force, the group disbanded. Losing two members of the group who quit made Jack feel humiliated because he perceived it as a failure of his leadership. And now, Jack wants to reunite Shadow Force: “I’m getting the band back together,” he says. The goal of the reunited Shadow Force is to find and murder Isaac, Kyrah and Ky.
There’s an underlying reason why Jack is on this evil vendetta. Years before Kyrah met Isaac, she had a fling with Jack. He wanted a more serious relationship than what Kyrah was willing to give, so she broke up with Jack, who has been bitter about it ever since. Isaac finds out about this love triangle later when Kyrah inevitably reunites with Isaac and Ky. Jack happens to have a private island in Colombia, where he gathers the reunited Shadow Force for secret meetings.
“Shadow Force” has a poorly written subplot about Jack being secretary general of G7, a group of countries (similar to the real-life G10), that have formed an alliance for economic reasons. The only reason why this G7 subplot seems to exist is to show Jack snarling at international leaders during a G7 conference and angrily reminding people not to call him “secretary” but to call him by his full title of “secretary general.” Jack acts more like a crime boss than a busy politician/spy.
The other members of Shadow Force are extremely generic. Anino (played by Jénel Stevens-Thompson), Cysgod (played by Marvin Jones III), Scath (played by Sala Baker), Moriti (played by Natalia Reyes) and Varjo (played by Yoson An) all have names that are more interesting than their blank-void personalities. The movie gives no personal information about these characters, which makes it too easy to predict their fate in this shoddily made film.
There are two other people looking for Isaac: Marvella “Auntie” Clanter (played by Da’Vine Joy Randolph) and Marcus “Unc” Owens (played by Cliff “Method Man” Smith), who are government agents with formerly close ties to Isaac and Kyrah. Auntie and Unc are a sometimes-bickering couple who are work partners and love partners. Unc and Auntie are first seen looking for Isaac at notorious party island Ibiza, Spain, when it just really looks like an excuse for Unc and Auntie to party in an exotic locale. Oscar-winning actress Randolph is doing another sassy character, while Smith continues to be typecast as a character with street smarts who likes to bend the rules.
You can almost do a countdown to all the tiresome and unimaginative things that happen in “Shadow Force,” whose action scenes of shootouts, explosions and fist fights are sloppily choreographed and often look downright ludicrous. There are not-very-surprising double crosses between certain characters. And the dialogue so putridly horrible, it’s a minor miracle the cast members were able to not laugh when saying unintentionally funny lines of dialogue.
“Shadow Force” is one of those abominable action movies where people get in brutal fights and say they’re going to kill their opponents right away, but then they end up standing around and talking or glaring and each other. One of the worst scenes in the movie is when Jack is at the mercy of a law enforcement agent who has his captured and cornered Jack, but the law enforcement agent allows Jack to just walk away, with no explanation. It all just seems to be a way for Jack to have the inevitable showdown with the expected people.
One of the few bright spots in “Shadow Force” is Kamara’s scene-stealing performance as Ky. There’s a cute scene where Ky reveals to Kyrah that Isaac’s favorite song is “Truly,” but Isaac doesn’t want to admit it. It turns out that “Truly” was the theme song for the wedding of Isaac and Kyrah. Kamara has a bright future ahead if he continues to be an actor. He deserves to be in much better movies than “Shadow Force.”
Some of the comedy revolves around Ky saying adult things to demonstrate that he hears things that are inappropriate for children his age. In a very “inside joke” part of the movie, Ky mentions the Wu-Tang Clan, which is the rap group that has “Shadow Force” co-star Smith as member under his rap name Method Man. “You can’t fuck with the Wu-Tang Clan,” Ky chirps, as the adults laugh at the kid’s foul-mouthed comment. Ky also gets some uncomfortable laughs from the adults when the Commodores song “Brick House” (also written by Richie) is played in a scene, Ky blurts out that it’s a song about “breasts and booties.”
Putting all of these kid jokes aside, “Shadow Force” is appallingly inept in showing how Kyrah and Isaac constantly put Ky in danger during the couple’s strategy of “kill or be killed” when dealing with their ex-Shadow Force teammates. The spouses try to cover up the truth and outrght lie to Ky every time the assassins come after them. But by the time Ky is put in a trunk of a car that is shot at, flips over, and crashes into a lake, or when he sees people using military assault rifles all over the place, it’s kind of insulting that anyone would think this kid hasn’t figured out that something is very wrong and that people are trying to kill his parents.
During all of this mayhem, Kyrah and Isaac occasionally speak French to each other, as if that’s supposed to make them look more romantic. It doesn’t. Sy (who has done better work in other movies) is very stiff in his “Shadow Force” role as Isaac. Washington and Sy have lukewarm chemistry together as Kyrah and Isaac and are more convincing as parents to Ky. Strong is just doing another version of the villains that he’s played on screen in many other roles. “Shadow Force” might be slightly entertaining if you enjoy watching mindless movies to laugh at, but the movie is funny for all the wrong reasons, and it’s not so amusing if you’d rather spend your time doing other things.
Lionsgate released “Shadow Force” in U.S. cinemas on May 9, 2025.