Del reviews ‘Carry-On’

Image by Netflix

“Carry-On” Starring Taron Egerton, Jason Bateman, Sofia Carson. Directed by Jaume Collet-Serra. Rated PG-13. 1 hour, 59 minutes long.

Del’s take

“Carry-On,” the new thriller from Netflix, is “Die Hard” without the charismatic lead and relatable love interest. But its antagonist, while no Hans Gruber, does provide a satisfying level of menace and the Al Powell role is greatly and satisfyingly expanded.

“Carry-on” takes place at an airport, which I suppose makes it “Die Hard 2.” Taron Egerton plays the role of Ethan Kopek, the self-doubting and somewhat listless boyfriend of Nora Parisi (Sofia Carson), both of whom work at LAX. Kopek is languishing at his TSA job of running a metal detector over perpetually angry Karens flying from Los Angeles to wherever Karens go to roost. What he really wants to do is be a cop. But he applied and was rejected, so now he’s marking time and not really going anywhere in life.

After a pep talk from Nora, Kopek presses his boss, Phil Sarkowski (the always excellent Dean Norris of “Breaking Bad” fame) for a turn at the scanning machine, a step up from his lowly metal detecting duties. After some pushback Sarkowski obliges, and it’s here where events take a turn for the malevolent. Kopek is handed an ear piece over which he receives instructions to let a certain bag pass through the detector or people will die, including Nora.

Thus begins the meat of “Carry-On,” with Kopek racing against time, his fellow TSA agents, the Los Angeles PD and the mysterious voice over the ear piece (the unnamed Jason Bateman in a rare, dark role) to thwart a catastrophe.

“Carry-On” suffers from a couple of problems, most notably pacing, with fully the first half of the movie devoted to character development and backstory. At times the pacing was so glacial I was tempted to switch to “Squid Games 2.” But over a period of two days I managed to muck my way through all the nonsense about meeting Dad’s expectations and not letting one failure get you down, and finally the action commenced.

Once there the movie moved along briskly, admittedly with a few hitches in logic. I felt I was being asked to suspend my disbelief way too often, more frequently than in “Die Hard.”

The other problem was casting. Taron Egerton is a good enough actor and I loved him in the “Kingsman” movies, but here he seems weak and indecisive, not at all like Bruce Willis’ flawed but heroic John McClain. Sofia Carson was way too exotic for her role as Kopek’s pregnant girlfriend.

What Egerton and Carson lack as leads, however, Jason Bateman and Danielle Deadwyler more than make up for in their roles as antagonist and the LA PD detective who is inadvertently drawn into the terroristic confrontation. Bateman can’t match Alan Rickman’s energy as Hans Gruber in “Die Hard” but he doesn’t try. In “Carry-On” he’s a subdued avatar for evil, and maybe a symbol for the American imperative of capitalism at any cost. Deadwyler’s portrayal of Det. Elena Cole pretty much stole the show for me. I’d like to see her in a movie or TV show of her own. What else can I say? She was sensational!

If I were to grade “Carry-On” I’d give it a solid B. It’s a good enough action movie that’s slow to get going, and maybe I didn’t care as much as I should have about the protagonist and his love interest. But the action is terrific and the other characters are sufficiently engaging to carry me over the hump.

Del Stone Jr. is a former journalist and a writer.