(2025) Play Dirty - A Not too Sophisticated Heist Movie with Pretty Entertaining Action Based on Character from Best Selling Novels

Last Wednesday, this movie was released on Prime Video but as I just came back from holiday and busy with other activities (including catching up ongoing series), I only got the chance to watch it last night. It was something that intrigued me due to its premise. OK without further ado, here's more on the movie.

Brief Story Line

Parker (Mark Wahlberg - Flight Risk, The Family Plan etc) was a professional robber who had gain fame for doing many successful heist jobs. After finishing the latest job, Parker somehow was drawn by his former getaway driver Zen (Rosa Salazar - Brand New Cherry Flavor TV series, Birdbox etc) into an even larger score involving major New York crime syndicate called The Outfit led by Lozini (Tony Shalhoub - Monk TV series, Cars trilogy etc) and his right hand man Kincaid (Nat Wolff - Body Cam, The Stand mini series etc).

Parker decided to take on the job even though he distrust Zen completely. He recruited few persons to assist in the heist including his old friend Grofield (LaKeith Stanfield - Haunted Mansion, Atlanta TV series etc), Ed Mackey (Keegan-Michael Key - The Super Mario Bros. Movie, Why Him? etc), his wife Brenda (Claire Lovering - Gold Diggers TV series etc) and getaway driver Stan (Chai Hansen - The New Legends of Monkey TV series etc). Together they tried to do the heist while trying to avoid the Outfit who apparently had some history with Parker years before.

So how would the story conclude? You could find out in this movie.

End of Brief Story Line

If you have frequently read my posts, you would know that heist is one of the genre that I like watching. Be it a simple one or complicated one, I would still be able to enjoy it (obviously sophistication would play major role in entertainment value for me). Anyway this film was interesting because even though the major heist was not truly sophisticated, but the preparation was pretty exciting, plus there were few twists as well. I was quite surprised with some of them, but the supposedly shocking twist towards the end was rather predictable.

I also liked the action sequence which was awesomely done, particularly the one involving moving train and the interesting opening scene & the finale. I think the director Shane Black (also credited as co-writer) whose prior experience including The Predator 2018 version, The Nice Guys and few others did a good job in providing entertaining action scenes here. During the opening sequence, I noticed that the movie was based on "Parker" series by Richard Stark. After further reading, I found out that Parker was a fictional character created by Donald E. Westlake under pen name Stark. Some of the novels with Parker as protagonist have been adapted into movies such as 2013 Parker starring Jason Statham, 1999 Payback starring Mel Gibson and several others. 

The film actually had a pretty large ensemble cast. In addition to the names above, there were appearances of Chukwudi Iwuji (The Day of the Jackal TV series, Daniel Isn't Real etc) as billionaire Phineas Paul, Thomas Jane (Run Hide Fight, Monster Trucks etc) as Parker's crew Philly, Gretchen Mol (3:10 to Yuma, Boardwalk Empire TV series etc) as Philly's wife Grace and few others in support/minor capacity. Mark Wahlberg seemed to be fitting as this Parker character. Though I never read any of the novels, but he seemed to be roughly similar to the way he was illustrated in those (like his impatience, his trigger happy and so on). Btw, this movie was not a full adaptation of any of Westlake aka Stark's novels but instead an original story. 

Critics were mixed in their reviews of the movie although Prime Video audience seemed to be more receptive as it made it to the top chart in various countries, including Indonesia. I myself was quite entertained by the action and that train job. The humor though was not exactly good for me, especially scenes involving Ed and Brenda's characters that were really not funny (surprising considering Keegan-Michael Key usually pretty fun to watch). Movie's duration was pretty long with 128 minutes including closing credits, but no mid or post end credit scene. I did feel that this was intended to be the start of a new series of films revolving around Parker and/or Grofield. But let's see if Amazon MGM feel this to be a success to warrant for sequel. So if you are interested in another heist movie with plenty of pretty awesome action, then you probably would enjoy this one like I did. As long as you do not expect comedic moments or a brilliantly sophisticated heist, then you should be OK.

Mike's movie moments rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars