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After more than a year of pandemic-induced stay-at-home orders, audiences are eager to hit movie theaters and reunite in a dark room with a larger-than-life big screen and booming sound. As theaters slowly open up, studios are gleefully releasing titles in preparation for what is hopeful to be a profitable and exciting big summer launch. Will "Hitman Wife’s Bodyguard" kickstart the action?

In 2017's " The Hitman's Bodyguard ," with his reputation destroyed after a painfully unsuccessful delivery of a distinguished Japanese client, triple-A protection agent Michael Bryce ( Ryan Reynolds ) was reduced to a second-class bodyguard for hire, accepting an offer from Interpol to escort an international assassin, Darius Kincaid ( Samuel L. Jackson ), from Manchester to the Hague. The mismatched duo were forced to put aside their grudges with comedic, action-driven results. However, with his beloved Sonia ( Salma Hayek ) now behind bars, Kincaid was willing to do anything for her release, even if it meant risking his own life.

As this film opens, Bryce is still brooding over losing his triple-A status, and is highly encouraged by his therapist (hilariously portrayed by Caroline Goodall ) to put his guns away and go on a quiet, restful Italian holiday in Capri. As a bluegrass soundtrack bellows in the background, it become apparent his vacation will be short-lived when Sonia appears guns blazing, this time enlisting Michael to assist with rescuing Darius. Eventually, the trio are forced by Interpol agent Bobby ( Frank Grillo ) to track down a device possessed by a criminal named Aristotle ( Antonio Banderas ), who desires to thrust all of Europe into a blackout as revenge for sanctions on the Greek economy.  

Not quite as straight-faced as hit franchises like those about Ethan Hunt or James Bond, "Hitman's Wife’s Bodyguard" thrives on making fun of this entire international spy/hitman premise while utilizing the charm of three of Hollywood’s most beloved stars: Hayek, Jackson, and Reynolds. All are immensely gifted at taking farce to a whole new level, one laden with four-letter words that make for a “mouth in need of an exorcism,” mixed with immense physicality that makes Hayek look like an Avenger from the MCU, and witty dialogue that sounds more improvised than scripted.

Reynolds proves yet again why he thrives in satirical action-thriller flicks with the same command and comedic bravado that has given long-standing careers to the likes of Will Ferrell , Adam Sandler , and Ben Stiller . Jackson is an unsung cinematic legend whose ownership of cursing to the point of making it sound like a completely different language laced with a little sugar and spice is always entertaining regardless of what film and genre he's in. However, the real treat is watching an on-screen reunion between Banderas and Hayek. After more than 20 years, their chemistry is still just as palpable and thrilling as in Robert Rodriguez's breakthrough " Desperado ." I could have just had the whole film revolve around their infused storyline. 

Hayek’s no-nonsense attitude in real-life melts into Sonia, making her a woman on-screen that is no one’s damsel in distress. Her ability to hold her own with the boys, kicking butt and taking names in fight scenes, leaves you wanting more every time. The extra added twist of having Morgan Freeman as Bryce’s dad (an award-winning bodyguard in his own right) be simultaneously dismissive with a fatherly vibe is also hysterical. There are also a few clever nods back to the original with the pair being surrounded by nuns, Sonia’s use of the word ‘cucaracha’ referring to Darius, bullets flying every two seconds, and the Lionel Richie hit "Hello" as the theme song for the hitman and his wife. 

Directed by Patrick Hughes , this comic book-energy spy adventure, gorgeously captured by cinematographer Terry Stacey and keenly scripted with barbed dialogue from Tom O’Connor, Brandon Murphy , and Phillip Murphy, is heavy on blood, guts, action, and star power. It really is time for a summer movie season again. 

Available in theaters on June 16.

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Film credits.

Hitman's Wife's Bodyguard (2021)

Rated R for strong bloody violence throughout, pervasive language, and some sexual content.

116 minutes

Ryan Reynolds as Michael Bryce

Samuel L. Jackson as Darius Kincaid

Salma Hayek as Sonia Kincaid

Antonio Banderas as Aristotle Papadopolous

Morgan Freeman as Senior

Frank Grillo as Interpol Agent

Richard E. Grant as Seifert

• Patrick Hughes

Writer (story)

• Tom O'Connor
• Brandon Murphy
• Philip Murphy

Cinematographer

• Terry Stacey
• Michael J. Duthie
• Jack Hutchings
• Atli Orvarsson

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‘The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard’ Review: Three’s (Bad) Company

Ryan Reynolds, Samuel L. Jackson and Salma Hayek are back for a rude and rowdy sequel.

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By Jeannette Catsoulis

“The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard” is loud, lazy, profane and well nigh incoherent. It’s also at times quite funny, with a goofy vulgarity that made me giggle. There isn’t a whit of wit from one end to the other; instead, this trashy-to-the-max sequel to “The Hitman’s Bodyguard” (2017) lunges shamelessly for the lizard brain. In the eyes of American action comedies, we are all reptiles.

Four years after a traumatizing encounter with the assassin Darius Kincaid (Samuel L. Jackson), Michael Bryce (Ryan Reynolds), the once-triple-A-rated bodyguard, has lost his career and possibly his mind. His therapist suggests an Italian vacation and a sabbatical from guns and mayhem. Yet barely has he taken her advice, packing only pepper spray and Chekhov’s pen knife (old habits die hard), when he’s hijacked by Darius’s wife, Sonia (Salma Hayek), a fuming, foulmouthed con artist.

So begins a plot so dashed-off and irrelevant that it barely deserves noting, being no more than a framework for insane car chases, gunfights, explosions and a sky-high body count. Filming in Croatia, Italy, Britain and Slovenia, the returning director, Patrick Hughes, encourages his stars and stunt men to run the show. Immoderation rules as the titular threesome race to stop a demented Greek billionaire (a squandered Antonio Banderas) who plans to use Croatian hackers to tinker with the European power grid. Which is apparently located in a single hub in the depths of the ocean.

While the screenplay — by Tom O’Connor (who wrote the first film), Phillip Murphy and Brandon Murphy — struggles to make one lick of sense, the performers retreat to their comfort zones. For Jackson, that means being so laid back at times he’s almost supine; for Reynolds, whose character sustains more abuse than a crash-test dummy, it means reminding us that wisecracks are the best weapons. Morgan Freeman shows up in a role I won’t spoil, and poor Frank Grillo — apparently unaware he’s in a cartoon — plays a Boston cop-turned Interpol agent with an admirably redundant solemnity.

Hayek, thankfully, harbors no highfalutin illusions about Sonia, whose Chaucerian way with a curse is matched only by her double-D libido and industrial-strength vocal cords. The performance is at once exhausting and awe-inspiring, making Sonia’s frustrated desire for a child one of the film’s more horrifying subplots. Yet, hearing Sonia wail over the disappointing dimensions of her vagina, I also heard the hoofbeats of the next movie. Any takers for “The Hitman’s Wife’s Surrogate’s Bodyguard”?

The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard Rated R for farcical violence and a filthy mouth. Running time: 1 hour 56 minutes. In theaters.

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The hitman's wife's bodyguard, common sense media reviewers.

Profane, violent comedy sequel isn't quite on target.

A Lot or a Little?

What you will—and won't—find in this movie.

Amid the violence and the humor is a message about

Lead characters are shown to be smart, super skill

Very high body count -- often at hands of lead cha

Amorous married couple makes out, including breast

Extremely strong profanity throughout: "ass," "a--

Range Rover vehicles featured. Jaguar, Gucci, and

Comments indicating that cocaine is cool. Heavy dr

Parents need to know that the action comedy The Hitman's Wife's Bodyguard is the sequel to The Hitman's Bodyguard. It re-teams Ryan Reynolds (as uptight, safety-first bodyguard Michael Bryce, who's still trying to regain his Triple-A certification), Samuel L. Jackson (as high-level assassin Darius…

Positive Messages

Amid the violence and the humor is a message about embracing who you are, not seeking validation from others. But there's also a tendency to equate masculinity with brutality, and a character's efforts to restore his mental health are made fun of throughout.

Positive Role Models

Lead characters are shown to be smart, super skilled, and savvy -- but they're also callous about violence and killing people and not intended as role models. Women are depicted as intelligent and capable in a traditionally male-dominated industry. Racial diversity.

Violence & Scariness

Very high body count -- often at hands of lead characters. Shoot-outs, stabbings, explosions, physical fights, being hit with a blunt instrument. Many gun shots through the head and body. One character is repeatedly hit by a car.

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Violence & Scariness in your kid's entertainment guide.

Sex, Romance & Nudity

Amorous married couple makes out, including breast-fondling, speaking bluntly about sex, and having sex (bodies mostly blocked from view). A couple of brief moments of Sonia in lingerie-type outfits. Cleavage seen on several occasions.

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Sex, Romance & Nudity in your kid's entertainment guide.

Extremely strong profanity throughout: "ass," "a--hole," "bitch," "boobs," "d--k," "goddammit," "p---y," "s--t," and very frequent use of "f--k" and "motherf----r." Middle-finger gesture. "Jesus Christ!" used as an expletive. Character called "crazy."

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Language in your kid's entertainment guide.

Products & Purchases

Range Rover vehicles featured. Jaguar, Gucci, and Valentino mentioned, seen as aspirational. Villains shown as having wealth, but it's made clear that love and friendship are more important than money.

Drinking, Drugs & Smoking

Comments indicating that cocaine is cool. Heavy drinking in a bar. Character drugged without consent.

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Drinking, Drugs & Smoking in your kid's entertainment guide.

Parents Need to Know

Parents need to know that the action comedy The Hitman's Wife's Bodyguard is the sequel to The Hitman's Bodyguard . It re-teams Ryan Reynolds (as uptight, safety-first bodyguard Michael Bryce, who's still trying to regain his Triple-A certification), Samuel L. Jackson (as high-level assassin Darius Kincaid), and Salma Hayek (as Kincaid's wife, Sonia). As in the original, profanity flies as frequently as bullets ("f--k" is in practically every sentence). The body count is sky-high, with constant gunfire, stabbings, graphic headshots (and other wounds), and physical fights. While the first film was about Kincaid helping Bryce realize that some matters are out of his control, the goal this time around is making Bryce less responsible and more comfortable with killing. Equating masculinity with brutality (e.g., "men don't cry" and "men shoot stuff up"), the movie makes Bryce's emotional fragility the butt of the joke. And while Sonia is just as violent and profane as the guys, she's called "crazy" because her actions and words are more emotionally reactive. The Kincaids are honeymooning and are actively trying to get pregnant no matter where they are, although nothing more than making out and an over-the-blouse fondle is actually shown. There's some drinking, a character is drugged for laughs, and cocaine is talked about as if using it is a rite of passage to being cool. To stay in the loop on more movies like this, you can sign up for weekly Family Movie Night emails .

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Community Reviews

• Parents say (4)
• Kids say (12)

Based on 4 parent reviews

More inappropriate than the first

Non-stop f-bombing in first 10 mins, what's the story.

THE HITMAN'S WIFE'S BODYGUARD reunites Ryan Reynolds and Samuel L. Jackson as blacklisted bodyguard Michael Bryce and assassin Darius Kincaid, respectively. Brought together by Kincaid's wife, Sonia ( Salma Hayek ), the trio is pressured into accepting an Interpol assignment to stop a powerful villain ( Antonio Banderas ) from destroying Europe.

Is It Any Good?

The hits keep on coming, but the laughs are a bit weaker in this fun but uneven sequel -- and so is Michael Bryce. Reynolds' character is now traumatized from his efforts to protect Kincaid, and his efforts to restore his mental health are made fun of throughout. It's no surprise that the movie's dialogue references classic '80s action comedies, because The Hitman's Wife's Bodyguard is a regression to that era's problematic attitudes. We're back to "men don't cry," "men don't need mental health help," and "men shoot stuff up" -- albeit with a 2021 twist: "so do women." And on that note, Sonia is just as violent and profane as the guys -- but for her behavior, she's called "crazy," because her actions and words are more emotionally reactive.

What made the first film a hit (no pun intended) is what always elevates action buddy comedies: the banter and chemistry between two equal opposites forced to work together. Adding a third person into the mix knocks off the balance. Now the Kincaids are teamed up against Bryce, so he's no longer the foil. Instead, he's positioned more as a puppy that they kick -- and that's not necessarily funny. Plus, the script just isn't as good and can be hard to follow. Still, the mistakes are covered up by cool stunts, fast action, and take-me-there scenery. Viewers go on a visual vacation as the threesome carries out their mission throughout glamorous European locales. Bottom line? The reliable magic of Reynolds, Jackson, and Hayek keeps some fun intact, but this shoot-'em-up actioner is less of a blast than it could have been.

Talk to Your Kids About ...

Families can talk about the violence in The Hitman's Wife's Bodyguard . Do you think there's a message underneath the carnage, or is this simply an action film that's not meant to be taken seriously?

How does The Hitman's Wife's Bodyguard compare to other comedies in the way it approaches racial differences? Compare and contrast the ways in which race is addressed in other similar films, such as Lethal Weapon , Rush Hour , and Men in Black .

How does this film meet the criteria of the "buddy movie" formula so often employed in films?

Are drinking and drug use glamorized here? Are there realistic consequences? Why does that matter?

Why it is important to support those who express a need for help when it comes to mental health? How does entertainment's attitude contribute to or eradicate a stigma when it comes to emotional wellness?

Movie Details

• In theaters : June 16, 2021
• On DVD or streaming : August 17, 2021
• Cast : Ryan Reynolds , Morgan Freeman , Samuel L. Jackson
• Director : Patrick Hughes
• Inclusion Information : Black actors
• Studio : Lionsgate
• Genre : Action/Adventure
• Run time : 118 minutes
• MPAA rating : R
• MPAA explanation : strong bloody violence throughout, pervasive language, and some sexual content
• Last updated : December 10, 2023

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• DVD & Streaming

Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard

• Action/Adventure , Comedy

Content Caution

In Theaters

• June 16, 2021
• Ryan Reynolds as Michael Bryce; Salma Hayek as Sonia Kincaid; Samuel L. Jackson as Darius Kincaid; Antonio Banderas as Aristotle Papadopolous; Morgan Freeman as Senior; Tom Hopper as Magnusson

Home Release Date

• August 17, 2021
• Patrick Hughes

Distributor

Movie review.

Bodyguard Michael Bryce always considered himself to be the best of the best. Well, that’s what he always wanted to be: a great bodyguard, just like his father before him. But since crossing paths and actually taking a bullet for the notorious hitman Darius Kincaid, Bryce’s dreams of bodyguard glory have crumbled into nightmarish visions of ineptitude and failure.

He lost his triple-A rated bodyguard license because of Darius and has actually been in therapy to rid himself of an abundance of anxious emotional torment for a long time since. And after all that work, Bryce is finally able to get his life back in order.

No, not as a bodyguard. He’s taking a sabbatical from guns and violence. In fact, he’s going to enjoy a nice vacation and cleanse his mind of all that. He’s going to ease back into a sense of good mental health.

Of course, that’s just before Darius’ wife, the infamous international con-artist Sonia Kincaid, shows up. And then brains start splattering, bodies start stacking and everything else explodes. It turns out that Darius is in trouble and he sent Sonia to fetch help in the form of one Michael Bryce.

Well, actually he said, “get anyone but Bryce,” but Sonia misheard in all the noise of bullets richocheting and brains splattering. So, wouldn’t you know it, just as Bryce was getting himself free of all this, some noisy death-dealing drags him back in. Well, that and a crazy woman who’s even more volitile and deadly than Darius himself.

And what exactly is Michael Bryce helping the dangerous Darius and Sonia with? Oh, who cares! There are Interpol agents and megalomaniacal big bosses at each other’s throats. The world is about to burn. People are shooting, things are exploding, goo is gushing and f-bombs are dropping.

There’s gotta be a plot in there somewhere!

Positive Elements

In the midst of all the many negatives here, the newly married Darius and Sonia are very much in love and very much hoping to have a baby. And you get the sense that Michael Bryce could have been an upstanding guy and a loving son if things had played differently.

Spiritual Elements

Upon hearing that Sonia and Darius want to have a child, Bryce cries out, “God have mercy on our souls!” And after he takes a shotgun blast for Sonia, she murmurs that he should have been a priest because of his kindness.

Later, after something good happens, Sonia lifts up a silent prayer to the heavens.

Sexual Content

Sonia is regularly ogled by Darius and other males around her (and the camera’s eye). She not only wears several different form-fitting and low-cut outfits, but in one scene she takes off her shirt and runs around in a very revealing bustier.

As newlyweds, Sonia and Darius make it clear that they’re still in their honeymoon phase, and so we see them kissing and making out repeatedly. They also have fully clothed, noisy sex twice while Bryce is forced to listen. The majority of the sexual movement is just off screen, but the action is clear. And the two also talk afterward about their orgasm. Sonia threatens to sexually abuse Bryce with a sex toy. Bryce pushes on Sonia’s chest while shoving her out of the range of a gun blast.

Other women reveal cleavage. And the movie is rife with crude sexual jokes.

Violent Content

Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard is a cacophony of carnage—sometimes played as a sort of joke with bodies flying everywhere in slow motion. Heads explode and bullets (sometimes shot from a distance, sometimes in execution-style close-ups) splatter brains and goo on people and scenery.

A man is smothered with a plastic bag, another stabbed through the chin. People have their eyes gouged out off camera, but we see the bloody results. A guy is hit repeatedly by quickly moving vehicles, and he later crashes through a car window while driving. Things are blown up by RPG shells and explosives of various stripes. Vehicles smash, crash and blow up in the course of several car chases, and a helicopter explodes in the air. A woman is killed by a heavyset man falling out of a carnival ride. (Another woman talks of her mom being eaten by a shark.) A guy is hit repeatedly with a cattle prod. People are strangled and beaten; necks are snapped. Several individuals are killed with knives and swords and one guy has his throat ripped out by a swinging mace. And, of course, people are shot in the chest, arms, legs and crotch.

Did I mention that a lot of things blow up?

Crude or Profane Language

More than 100 f-words and 25 s-words join multiple uses of “b–ch,” “a–hole” and “d–n.” There are some 10 crude exclamations of male and female genitalia (including two uses of the c-word). And God’s and Jesus’ names are abused eight times total (God being combined with “d–n” once).

Drug and Alcohol Content

People drink wine at dinner and booze in clubs. During a bar fight, someone grabs an open bottle of booze and begins swigging away. Someone suggests doing some coke. Several people are shot with knock-out darts. And one guy gets about six of them shot into his face.

After taking a shotgun blast to his Kevlar vest, Bryce is given several “pain pills” that turn out to be Lithium. They have the expected debilitating result.

Other Negative Elements

A father betrays his son and tells him he is a stain on his legacy.

Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard is one of those sequels that enthusiastically embraces the cinematic postulate that bigger … no, bombastically bigger is always better. So, it takes the insanely bloody violence, vulgar one-liners and the mindless destruction of the first film and sets that as its starting line.

Yeah, there’s definitely a sense that this cartoon of crassitude has been doused with gasoline, strapped to a bucket of bottle rockets and hit with a blowtorch. But once the fifth or sixth head blows out on a back wall, and the hundredth f-bomb rattles your eardrums, I mean, where ya gonna go?

It certainly ain’t up.

After spending more than two decades touring, directing, writing and producing for Christian theater and radio (most recently for Adventures in Odyssey, which he still contributes to), Bob joined the Plugged In staff to help us focus more heavily on video games. He is also one of our primary movie reviewers.

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‘Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard’ Review: Action Comedy Sequel Has Better Eye than the Original

David ehrlich.

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The only real upside to “The Hitman’s Bodyguard” — a low-stakes action comedy from the dog days of the 2017 summer movie season that’s better remembered for grossing $176 million off a $69 million budget than it is for anything else — is that it was an “original” film. It may have been a thoroughly mediocre outing, but it was one dropped into a multiplex world so clogged with superhero blockbusters and other well-established IP (“Baywatch” mania was sweeping the nation!) that any fresh offerings seemed to float up to the surface by dint of their novelty alone.

Needless to say, “Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard” doesn’t have the same advantage. But what this breezy sequel lacks in newness it makes up for with a more assured sense of self, twice the possessive apostrophes, and a picaresque approach to comic violence that veers closer to the likes of “Lupin the Third” than it does to the weighty event films that people have to come expect this time of year. No one will ever confuse this for a good movie — it lacks any evident aspirations of goodness, as if returning director Patrick Hughes made the best thing he could while strapped to a bomb that would explode if its Rotten Tomatoes score ever went above 50 percent Fresh — but it’s really, really hard to work up any real hatred for a goofy action programmer in which Antonio Banderas plays a psychopathic billionaire named Aristotle Papadopolous. Spoiler alert: He’s Greek.

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To that point, the most important bit of context you need in order to understand what’s happening in “Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard” — a movie title so awkward that you can practically hear Sean Parker begging Lionsgate to add back the missing “the” — is that its predecessor only grossed $351,000 in Greece. Why else would a wannabe blockbuster aimed at international audiences opt for a villain whose evil plan is to destroy the rest of the European Union so that Greece is returned to its ancient glory? Even if Aristotle’s weapon of choice is some vague computer crap (Networks! Power Grids! Explosions!), it’s beyond refreshing to see a bad guy who isn’t just trying to steal a dangerous piece of surveillance tech so that he can sell our data or whatever. And while Banderas isn’t given the screen time or wiggle room that his talent demands, it doesn’t hurt that he’s always dressed like the angry ghost of Louis Vuitton just vomited all over his entire body.

It might also help to know a few details about the heroes, even if getting lost in this movie would be harder than getting lost on an escalator. The last time we saw neurotic bodyguard Michael Bryce ( Ryan Reynolds ) he was taking a bullet for unkillable hitman and part-time frenemy Darius Kincaid ( Samuel L. Jackson ), a supposed betrayal that has since resulted in him losing his license and being stripped of his access to the franchise’s John Wick-like subculture of private security agents.

When the sequel picks up four years later, Michael is still having sweat nightmares about the Bodyguard of the Year Awards (the Oscars of kevlar) and seeing a therapist who’s very sick of his whining; she orders him to take a sabbatical from work and the weapons it requires, if only so that he’ll get the hell out of her office. It takes less than one scene to remember how ill-suited Reynolds is to the role of a nerdy headcase who can’t enjoy being hot and rich because he’s sad that he doesn’t have anyone to protect. Mildly amusing as it can be to watch Jackson emasculate him from 100 minutes on end, Reynolds needs a degree of cockiness to backstop his signature sarcasm, and so much of what his character does here feels like watching him strain for some muddled compromise between an assassin and an actuary.

Of course, when a comic actor like Reynolds is cast as the straight man, his co-stars have to go to great extremes if they want to function as proper foils. To borrow some dated internet parlance that’s already been sucked dry of its coolness by corporate Twitter accounts: Salma Hayek definitely understood the assignment. Reprising her wacky role as Darius’ devoted wife and ratcheting things way the hell up now that she doesn’t have to spend the whole movie locked in a cell at The Hague, Hayek plays Sonia Kincaid as a foul-mouthed sociopath with an itchy trigger-finger and a maternal drive even bigger than her breasts (which serve as their own plot point, several times over).

It’s nothing she hasn’t done before, but her performance is over the top in a way that helps lift the entire movie toward the heightened reality of its cartoon world — especially valuable in a film that’s shot with all the style of a “Burn Notice” episode, even if its plethora of Italian locations lend it the sense of place that modern blockbusters tend to lose underneath a layer of CGI muck. There simply isn’t anyone else on Earth who can deliver a line like “I’m gonna put on a strap-on and fuck your dreams until they become nightmares” with such effortless grace, and Hayek leans into the ridiculousness of it all with the same energy. It’s almost touching to watch the 54-year-old actress own her sexuality so completely that Sonia’s age is only referenced in terms of her fertility, and even more so to see her ground this ridiculous movie in certain biological realities without ever capitulating to them.

At the very least, Sonia’s desire for a child is easier to believe than Michael’s desire for a father, as the generally fleet-footed “Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard” slams to a halt when the daddy issues take hold (if you don’t already know who plays Bryce Sr., you’re in for a big surprise). Other detours fall similarly flat — Frank Grillo is wasted as an American Interpol agent who’s inexplicably desperate to be reassigned to Boston — but the film is held together by the centrifugal force of watching its famous cast bounce around Europe and shoot anyone who gets in their way.

Terrible green screen, globs of digital blood, and record-scratch sound effects in place of actual jokes are only potholes along the road for a summer movie that knows what it is, and is slightly less afraid to embrace that than its previous iteration was. If “what it is” would be unsatisfying in a more creative era of popcorn cinema, well, not even the finest bodyguard in the world can protect us from the threat of mediocrity.

Lionsgate will release “Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard” in theaters on Wednesday, June 16.

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Review: Everybody deserves better than the dreadful sequel ‘The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard’

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Back in 2017, I reviewed Patrick Hughes’ noisy buddy action-comedy “The Hitman’s Bodyguard” and wrote, “this film should have traded the hitman’s bodyguard for his wife — she’s the most compelling character in it.” It seems they took my advice for the sequel, “The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard,” and after watching it I realize how very, very wrong I was four years ago. I’m so sorry.

The outlandish Sonia Kincaid ( Salma Hayek) is much more appealing in small doses, popping up as a bit of feminine comic relief, as she did in the first film . In the sequel, she is, of course, the wife of the hitman (Samuel L. Jackson), and indeed, with a bodyguard (Ryan Reynolds) in tow, though he’s not doing much guarding of bodies. It’s apparent quite quickly that Sonia in the lead is far too much Sonia. Then again, “too much” tends to be a trend with these movies.

Hughes, and screenwriters Tom O’Connor, Brandon Murphy and Phillip Murphy take a more-is-more approach to everything in “The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard”: more explosions, more gun battles, more boob jokes, more daddy issues, more reckless rampaging around Europe. At least they’ve brought this one in at a cool 99 minutes, after the first film pushed two punishing hours for absolutely no reason at all.

In this iteration, Reynold’s Michael Bryce, a sensitive soul, laments the loss of his Triple A bodyguard license after the events of the first film. At the behest of a therapist, he decamps to Capri to decompress, where he bumps into Sonia at a mass shooting, as you do. Sonia, who can only be described as sexily terrifying, slightly feral and aggressively maternal, has scooped Michael up at the request of her husband Darius. Except she misheard him, and soon the odd throuple are unhappily on the road in Italy, dodging bullets, per usual.

What overly complicated international incident have they gotten themselves into this time? It involves Antonio Banderas as a flamboyant Greek shipping magnate/terrorist, Aristotle Papadopolous, who is procuring diamond-tipped drills on the black market in order to access the data junction boxes that control Europe. When the junction boxes are infected with a virus, the electrical grid goes hooey, sowing chaos. He’s doing this as revenge for EU sanctions on Greece, or just for funsies. Who knows. Frank Grillo is also involved as an American Interpol agent from Boston (you can tell because of the “accent”) who enlists the terrible threesome of Darius, Sonia and Michael (or as Sonia calls him, “BREECE”), to intercept Aristotle.

Along the way, the trio learns to work together and to work out their own issues while engaging in many, loud shootouts and car chases through picturesque European cities. It’s the kind of action filmmaking that makes you wince and recoil, rather than gape in wonder, especially as Reynolds gets tossed around like a rag doll. It doesn’t help that Hayek, Jackson and Reynolds provide a steady stream of shrieking, swearing and smarm, respectively. But that’s what they’ve been hired to deliver, and all three are nothing less than professionals.

Some may enjoy the cacophonous, raunchy, lowest-common-denominator dreck that “The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard” has to offer. To those I say, Godspeed. But it’s undeniable that the actors, the audiences, and the filmmakers all deserve better.

Katie Walsh is a Tribune News Service film critic.

‘The Hitman's Wife's Bodyguard’

Rated: R, for strong bloody violence throughout, pervasive language, and some sexual content Running time: 1 hour, 39 minutes Playing: Starts June 16 in general release

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The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard review – a nausea whack

This action comedy sequel is even more cliched and crass than the original

T he thuddingly stupid 2017 action comedy The Hitman’s Bodyguard gets the sequel it deserves. If anything, The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard is even more obnoxious and lazy, with a screenplay that imposes a thankless “Mexican hellcat” cliche of a role on Salma Hayek, and which eschews jokes in favour of lots of shouty swearing.

The dismal dialogue wouldn’t matter quite so much if at least the action sequences delivered a few thrills, but the whole thing is so shoddily put together it looks as though it was edited with a strimmer. Ryan Reynolds does himself very few favours in a role that trades on his least likable characteristics (the smirk and the fake tan).

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the hitman's wife's bodyguard

Running time: 99 minutes. Rated R (strong bloody violence throughout, pervasive language and some sexual content). In theaters.

The answer to the question “How many jokes can Salma Hayek crack about her own breasts?” has arrived in the form of a movie called “The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard.” Somebody else will have to add them up, though. There are so many, and I’m no mathematician.

And yet, somehow Hayek and the low-brow material she’s been regrettably handed are the best part of this unwanted, unnecessary sequel to the also-bad 2017 buddy cop film “ The Hitman’s Bodyguard .” Her returning co-stars Samuel L. Jackson and Ryan Reynolds are, respectively, coasting and unbearable.

Reynolds plays Michael Bryce, the ninny bodyguard, who was so traumatized by the events of the first movie that he’s been forced into therapy. His agonized therapist gets rid of the weirdo by telling him he’s “graduated” from their sessions and jets him off to the island of Capri for some R&R.

As soon as he arrives in Italy, though, his hotel pool is laid siege by gunmen (naturally) and he’s rescued by Sonia Kincaid (Hayek), the hitman’s wife. She needs Bryce’s help to save her husband Darius Kincaid (Jackson), the hitman, from his captors.

Reynolds’ high-pitched nerd shtick has worn thin in general over the years, and here his squeaky voice would be better suited to scaring away pigeons in a parking garage. He whines and squeals while Jackson rattles off “s–t”s and “f–k”s and Hayek shimmies around making emotional pronouncements. (Like I said, she’s the most entertaining of the lot). 

For such an idiotic film, the villainy afoot is mighty difficult to wrap your head around. The EU has put sanctions on Greece for some reason, so a rich countryman ( Antonio Banderas , looking and sounding about as Greek as Suzanne Somers ) decides to infect Europe’s internet grid with a virus that will destroy cars, trains, buildings and more in revenge.

It’s kind of like a Pierce Brosnan James Bond plot mixed with Michael Bay’s excesses and then watered down so as to become totally forgettable.

Bryce and the Kincaids’ role in this head-scratching scheme is convoluted, as is Frank Grillo’s special agent character, Bobby O’Neill, who spends the whole movie begging to be transferred back to Boston from London while referring to his Scottish female translator as “Sean Connery.”

Still, if it was better made, “The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard” would be your average bargain-bin action-comedy film. Director Patrick Hughes and screenwriters Tom O’Connor, Phillip Murphy and Brandon Murphy’s problem is that the balance of jokes and stakes is wildly off-kilter, so we don’t care much about anybody.

The characters are so wacky you don’t believe them as killers or strategists or even just bystanders who are in the right place at the right time. You simply don’t buy anything about them. Ever. Just wait until Morgan Freeman shows up on-screen in a role so far beneath him, you’d think he was getting career advice from Robert De Niro .

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‘Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard’ movie review: Salma Hayek livens up mild sequel

• July 15, 2021
• ★★½ , Movie Reviews

A bodyguard, a hitman, his wife, and her (former) lover all feature into the tangled mess of a narrative within the awkwardly titled Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard , a middling sequel to the middling 2017 feature The Hitman’s Bodyguard . The original film was not much of a critical or financial success, and didn’t exactly leave audiences clamoring for a follow-up, leaving this one feeling mostly perfunctory.

In Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard , Ryan Reynolds returns as Michael Bryce, a disgraced former bodyguard who has lost his license to protect following the events of The Hitman’s Bodyguard . Samuel L. Jackson is Darius Kincaid, the hitman Bryce was hired to protect in the earlier film, and needs some saving at the outset of this one after being kidnapped by Italian mafia goons.

Both stars were a lot of fun in the first movie, livening up a familiar odd couple road comedy with some committed turns. In Hitman’s Bodyguard’s Wife , meanwhile, Reynolds’ pathetic sadsack routine grows old fast, and Jackson is never given a chance to do much of anything.

Instead, Salma Hayek , who featured in a minor role in the first film, gets an extended chance to shine here as the titular wife and walks away with the movie. Her character, who longs to have a family, is the only one who is given any depth in this sequel; Hayek’s intense performance, which frequently explodes into onscreen violence, both breathes comedic life into the film while adding a dramatic undercurrent.

What constitutes a story in Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard , meanwhile, sucks any fleeting joy right out of the equation. It involves a Greek tycoon played by Antonio Banderas , who is threatening to destroy the European power grid with a deep sea drilling device in retaliation for EU sanctions on Greece, and a Boston Interpol agent, played by Frank Grillo , on his trail.

Through reasons of plot contrivance, Grillo’s Interpol agent arranges to have the bodyguard, the hitman, and his wife track down the Greek tycoon, who also happens to be the former lover of Hayek’s character. This leads to a familiar road movie territory through some scenic Italian locations, with our trio of leads bickering at each along the way.

Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard is passable as disposable entertainment, but fails to match the previous film’s sense of charm as it pushes things into over-the-top cartoon territory; even a first-rate Florence sequence can’t match a similar scene set in Amsterdam in the original. While Hayek steals the movie with an impassioned and emphatic performance, there’s only so much she can do to keep things buoyant in the midst of all the chaos.

Despite the derivative nature of the screenplay, director Patrick Hughes really knows how to put together an action movie. He keeps Hitman’s Bodyguard’s Wife peppered with enough shootouts and chase scenes to keep our attention and, perhaps more importantly, distract us from the nonsensical narrative.

An extended chase through the streets of Florence, so engaging that the filmmakers play it out through two different scenarios, serves as Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard’s highlight; a by-the-numbers finale aboard a yacht, meanwhile, is entirely underwhelming and ends things with a whimper.

Here’s hoping for better things from the director next time around; he’s not yet matched his excellent 2010 debut Red Hill with derivative Hollywood actioners including The Expendables 3 and these two Hitman’s Bodyguard movies.

Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard’s biggest sin: Morgan Freeman , who could have lent this movie the sense of gravitas it is sorely lacking, is wasted in a one-note role with a twist we see coming a mile away.

The Hitman's Wife's Bodyguard

• 2021 , Ahmet Mehmet , Alice McMillan , Anna-Maria Everett , Antonio Banderas , Barry Atsma , Blake Ritson , Brian Caspe , Caroline Goodall , Danko Jordanov , Didi Anderson , Dragan Mićanović , Frank Grillo , Gabriella Wright , Georgie Glen , Hitman's Wife's Bodyguard , Kristofer Kamiyasu , Michael Gor , Miltos Yerolemou , Morgan Freeman , Patrick Hughes , Rebecca Front , Richard E. Grant , Ryan Reynolds , Salma Hayek , Samuel L. Jackson , Sergio Torrico , Simón Andreu , Stewart Alexander , The Hitman's Bodyguard , Tine Joustra , Tom Hopper , Tsuwayuki Saotome

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The Hitman's Bodyguard

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Rent The Hitman's Bodyguard on Fandango at Home, Prime Video, Apple TV, or buy it on Fandango at Home, Prime Video, Apple TV.

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The Hitman's Bodyguard coasts on Samuel L. Jackson and Ryan Reynolds' banter -- but doesn't get enough mileage to power past an overabundance of action-comedy clichés.

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Patrick Hughes

Ryan Reynolds

Michael Bryce

Samuel L. Jackson

Darius Kincaid

Gary Oldman

Vladislav Dukhovich

Salma Hayek

Sonia Kincaid

Elodie Yung

Amelia Ryder

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The Hitman's Bodyguard

One of the world's top bodyguards gets a new client, a world class hitman who must testify at the International Criminal Court. They must put their differences aside and work together to mak... Read all One of the world's top bodyguards gets a new client, a world class hitman who must testify at the International Criminal Court. They must put their differences aside and work together to make it to the trial alive and on time. One of the world's top bodyguards gets a new client, a world class hitman who must testify at the International Criminal Court. They must put their differences aside and work together to make it to the trial alive and on time.

• Patrick Hughes
• Tom O'Connor
• Ryan Reynolds
• Samuel L. Jackson
• Gary Oldman
• 638 User reviews
• 309 Critic reviews
• 47 Metascore
• 1 win & 8 nominations

• Michael Bryce

• Darius Kincaid

• Vladislav Dukhovich

• Amelia Roussel
• Helicopter Pilot …

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• Trivia The song that Kincaid and the nuns are singing together in the van (much to Bryce's annoyance) is a 19th-century Italian traditional drinking song named "Bevilo Tutto", which encourages everyone to 'drink it all up'.
• Goofs When Professor Asimov testified at the trial that Dukhovich killed his wife and child, Dukhovich's attorney objected that this was hearsay and the court granted the objection and excluded the testimony. The testimony was not hearsay. Hearsay is testifying about what someone else said happened. Asimov was testifying about events that he directly witnessed and the testimony should have been allowed.

Michael Bryce : This guy single-handedly ruined the word "motherfucker."

• Crazy credits At the end of the credits there's an outtake with Ryan Reynolds having to wait for church bells to stop ringing.
• Alternate versions There are two versions available, the general theatrical release, and one edited for release in China. Runtimes are, respectively, "1h 58m (118 min)" and "1h 52m (112 min) (Mainland China Censored Version) (China)".
• Connections Featured in Sean Chandler Talks About: The Hitman's Bodyguard Movie Review (2017)
• Soundtracks Sittin' and Cryin' the Blues Performed by Memphis Slim and Willie Dixon Written by Willie Dixon Published by BMG Bumblebee (BMI) obo Hoochie Coochie Music (BMI) Courtesy of Fantasy Records

User reviews 638

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• August 18, 2017 (United States)
• United States
• Netherlands
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• Nu Boyana Film Studios
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• Nieuwe Achtergracht, Amsterdam, The Netherlands (street scenes)
• Summit Entertainment
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• $30,000,000 (estimated)
• $75,468,583
• $21,384,504
• Aug 20, 2017
• $183,431,147

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• Runtime 1 hour 58 minutes
• Dolby Atmos

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