Both the good guys and the bad guys work for the Miami-Dade Police Department in “The Rip,” which reunites “Good Will Hunting” buds Ben Affleck and Matt Damon for a dark, trust-no-one heist movie that’s conspicuously better than most Netflix originals and, frankly, right in line with a couple of films the boys made for Warner Bros. earlier this century: namely, “The Departed” and “The Town.” (Like those upscale crime movies, “The Rip” belongs on the big screen. The fact it can’t be seen that way underscores warnings that the streamer isn’t really interested in theatrical, whatever it might claim in order to acquire Warners.)
Colombian cartels are doing business in South Florida, but they’re hardly “the worst of the worst” in “Narc” director Joe Carnahan’s latest authority-questioning thriller. Instead, the intrigue is almost entirely internal, as dirty cops scheme to make off with more than $20 million in illicit cash — if only they could figure out where it’s hidden. Lt. Dane Dumars (Damon) has a pretty good idea, though the sheer scale of the haul catches him by surprise.
A heavily fictionalised retelling of the department’s biggest seizure, “The Rip”, opens with the waterfront execution of a respected captain, Jackie Velez (Lina Esco), by a pair of masked gunmen. From there, it accelerates into cat-and-mouse territory as Dumars, the officer she trusted most, leads his team to a nondescript house at the end of a sleepy suburban cul-de-sac.
When a young Colombian woman (Sasha Calle as Desi) opens the door, Dumars feels fairly confident that they’ve come to the right place. Sure enough, the newly renovated attic hides a hidden room, where barrel upon barrel of $100 bills are neatly stashed. Per local police procedure, when Florida cops seize any quantity of cash, they’re required to count the money on site. In this case, that makes Dumars and his team sitting ducks for anyone else with designs on their score.
Carnahan’s script introduces early the idea that Jackie was most likely killed by corrupt cops, which turns the entire scenario — a team of five holed up at the end of a street where the cartel appears to control every house — into a tense closed-circle mystery. “The Rip” clearly cost a lot of money, and yet, almost half the film unfolds in this single location: the run-down home Desi inherited from her abuela.
Though it’s still daylight out when Dumars’ crew enters the house, Carnahan and DP Juanmi Azpiroz treat the film like they’re making “Heat 2,” adopting the same sleek, satiny, almost-monochromatic look Michael Mann brought to his modern-day crime classic — also matching the ultra-wide aspect ratio. The Florida sun is nowhere to be seen, as gray skies make exteriors feel oppressive and dangerous (composer Clinton Shorter’s accelerated-pulse score amplifies the tension even further).
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Things are even more underlit inside the house, and it’s not long before night falls and everyone is moving under cloak of darkness, further obscured by a fine mist. The testosterone is palpable in this high-stakes poker game, as thick beards mask the faces of nearly half the cast (that goes for Damon, Affleck and co-star Kyle Chandler, at least). When guns go off, they spark bright like welding torches, while street lights glow, piercing the gloom — visuals that collectively reinforce the film’s cinematic ambitions.
Much has already been said about how “The Rip” defies Netflix’s prescribed rules for distracted viewership (where the plot must be restated multiple times for divided-attention audiences). But even those who give “The Rip” their full attention may find it hard to explain all the twists and double-crosses Carnahan crams into his gripping two-hour thriller — which is presumably why Netflix saw fit to publish a Tudum article entitled “The Rip’s Ending, Explained: Who Is the Traitor? And What Happens to the Money?”
The primary suspects are Dumars and his belligerent partner, Detective Sergeant J.D. Byrne (Affleck), as well as fellow officers Ro (Steven Yeun), Salazar (Catalina Sandino Moreno) and Baptiste (about-to-be-Oscar-nominated Teyana Taylor). Let’s stop for a minute and take in that cast: It’s only January, and Netflix has already set the bar incredibly high when it comes to assembling the most impressive (but still surprising) team imaginable. Normally, a shrewd viewer can look at such a lineup and guess who the villains are going to be, since such roles typically attract strong actors. But this is a next-level ensemble, and it’s not that easy.
Between the sheer complexity of the plot (what’s the deal with the cops who roll up in their cruiser? who was shooting up the house? why doesn’t Dumar try to arrest anyone from the cartel?) and the intricate way Carnahan assembles the puzzle, “The Rip” is easily worth a second viewing. Having done so myself, I can attest that it’s even more satisfying on closer inspection. Editor Kevin Hale is constantly cutting between the faces of Dumars’ team, showing each of their reactions to unplanned wrinkles, and once you know what everyone’s motives are, the performances prove even more satisfying (as do a couple of corny shadows, staged to keep us guessing).
According to a conversation Carnahan sets in the garage, the cops in “The Rip” make roughly $80,000 a year risking their lives to recover money earned from selling drugs and other serious crimes. At one point, Baptiste holds up a modest stack of bills and wonders aloud how just that amount might change her life. Imagine what $20 million could do. “The Rip” was made for nearly five times that sum, and though it’s hard to make sense of Netflix accounting, the money clearly went to good use — unless you count a lousy epilogue, set on Florida’s fakest looking beach. Surely they could’ve found a few more bucks.
From Variety US