Shadow Force (2025) | Film Review

As the opening moments hit the screen, there is nothing but upside in front of the audience. Kerry Washington, Omar Sy, Mark Strong, Da’Vine Joy Randalph, plus director Joe Carnahan in a slam-bang action flick revolving around underground assassins? Yes, please! Well, have you ever watched a film that seemed to have everything going for it, and then it completely missed the mark? As if it were driving down the highway and continually took all of the wrong exits? That’s Shadow Force.

Kerry Washington and Omar Sy star as former assassins Kyrah and Isaac, effectively they became a couple who went into hiding from their clandestine assassination club known as Shadow Force after Kyrah became pregnant with their child. Their plan is simple: lay low until they have confidence their remerging will keep their son, Ky (the delightful scene-stealer Jahleel Kamara), safe.

Years later, Isaac saves Ky in a bank robbery which makes the international news. This catches their former leader Cinder’s eye (Mark Strong, offering us his best Bond villain), and he tasks the remaining Shadow Force members with hunting them down. Cinder is an emerging bureaucrat who manipulates his government connections to force our duo into the open. Also, Da’Vine Joy Randolph and Method Man join in as Auntie and Unc to lighten the festivities up along for the way.

Everything above sounds as though, at the very least, this would be a fun popcorn flick. Flirty bits, gunplay, hand-to-hand combat, essentially a modern Mr. & Mrs. Smith. Director Joe Carnahan (The A-Team, Boss Level) has demonstrated repeatedly he knows how to shoot action, and everyone in the cast is absolutely up to the task.

Unfortunately, Shadow Force is simply not entertaining. It is an uninspired, cinematic slog which suffers from a convoluted story and generic visuals. All the pieces are here, but no one places them on the board correctly. Kerry Washington is having the most fun as Kyrah and has an easy chemistry with Sy, but the script moves their story forward in the clunkiest way possible with weak dialogue exchanges and predictably bland character development.

The editing is splotchy, the script is pedantic, the set-pieces are either mundane or too closely shot to comprehend, and the action in general is borderline low-budget Netflix Original quality at best. Furthermore, the title consistently reminded me of Tarantino’s Fox Force Five, which would have undoubtedly presented a sharper cinematic experience.

Though the cast do their best with the hand they are dealt, the script offers them little to chew on. All-in-all, Shadow Force is not a good film. It is not terrible either. Instead, it is a movie that is absolutely forgettable and bound for a streaming home in the very near future. Almost everyone involved deserves better.