Title – Wolfs (2024) 

Director – Jon Watts (Cop Car) 

Cast – George Clooney, Brad Pitt, Amy Ryan, Austin Abrams 

Plot – Two professionals fixers (Clooney and Pitt) get called in on the same job where they must learn to put their differences aside to come out of the situation on top.  

“My job is to make sure you do your job”

Review by Eddie on 30/09/2024

Well that was a disappointing way to spend a reported $200 million dollar budget.

The film that has finally caused Apple to look at their film release strategy moving forward, with this, their newest high profile release Wolfs skipping a large-format cinema release all together to encourage new users to sign up directly to their faltering streaming service, this star-studded affair is a lethargic and unmemorable Ocean’s 11 reunion that gives up a strong set-up to a mediocre at best end product that is a huge let down in multiple facets.

Director and writer Jon Watts first foray behind the camera that isn’t a Spider-Man product since his 2017 Marvel debut Spider-Man: Homecoming, Wolfs on paper appears to be an extremely enticing proposition with this dark comedy thriller pairing George Clooney’s and Brad Pitt’s nameless fixers (roles in which they supposedly netted $35 million dollar plus paydays for) on a job over the span of one night that gets them involved in all many of hijinks and twists. 

The whole concept is very Coen Brothers feeling early on and things start out promising enough as we are thrust straight into the action where Amy Ryan’s politician has found herself in need of some expert assistance with a near-naked dead body laying on the floor of her hotel room but from here on out events in Watts’s expensive excursion barely raise a pulse with the unnecessarily complex narrative losing most of its minimal lustre well before the end credits have rolled with not even the known chemistry between Pitt and Clooney able to salvage such a heartless offering. 

Friends on and off camera, the repertoire that the two heavy-hitting A-listers have built over numerous decades is certainly on show here as their two stoic professionals face hurdle after hurdle on a job they’d wished they never took but Watts is unable to ever get the most out of their individual or joint bag of tricks with the silver foxes only able to carry Wolfs so far across its oddly uneventful 100 minute run time that is broken up only by a cold looking car chase and a run in with some generic European goons. 

Offering about as much enjoyment as Pitt would’ve taken from multiple takes of sipping on a cold can of Coke in the films opening act (putting Pitt’s World War Z Pepsi ad to shame), it’s not hard to see why Wolfs was shunted from its originally large-scale cinematic foray with Apple needing to take urgent stock of how it invests in ample funds into feature projects if this is what 100’s of millions of dollars is getting them. 

Final Say – 

Oddly greenlit for a sequel I am unsure anyone will ever be asking for, Wolfs is a forgettable and disappointing Brad Pitt and George Clooney reunion that offers very little return for a project that was given everything to succeed to a much higher level. 

2 cans of soda out of 5