Guy Ritchie goes all out in this very silly trailer for Operation Fortune: Ruse De Guerre
The action-comedy stars Jason Statham, Aubrey Plaza, Hugh Grant, and Josh Hartnett
Early 2020 action movie The Gentlemen kind of suggested that Guy Ritchie had embraced self-parody, both because the movie was basically just a run of Guy Ritchie’s favorite Very British action tropes and because it was originally pitched under the Very British title Toff Guys, but if that was self-parody, what the hell is this trailer for Operation Fortune: Ruse De Guerre?
The movie stars Jason Statham as a Jason Statham-type character named Orson Fortune, whose team of super spies or whatever includes Aubrey Plaza, Cary Elwes, Bugzy Malone, and a seemingly endless supply of cool/funny action quips. Together, they have to defeat an arms dealer played by Hugh Grant—who, as hacky social media brands say, understood the assignment.
Then, just to throw another self-aware wink on the pile, Josh Hartnett is there as a Hollywood movie star whose biggest fan happens to be arms dealer Hugh Grant to join Statham’s crew in their plan to… save the world? The plot specifics aren’t totally clear, but it doesn’t seem like the kind of movie that’s overly concerned what’s happening as much as “how can what’s happening be as madcap as possible?” There are silly gunfights, silly car chases, silly banter between the good guys and the bad guy, but without necessarily being too winky or self-aware about how silly it all is.
It just looks like everyone involved is having a nice bit o’ fun, and it is always nice to see Jason Statham playing a funny action guy—even if it’s essentially the same character he played in Spy with Melissa McCarthy. That movie was also fun! Hopefully everything looking fun will translate to a good movie.
Anyway, Guy Ritchie’s Operation Fortune: Ruse De Guerre will be in theaters at some point in 2022 (this trailer just says “coming soon”).