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Ghosted, an action romantic comedy directed by Dexter Fletcher, which is out on Apple TV+ has become the most-watched film on the streaming platform. However, the film, which stars Chris Evans and Ana de Armas, has a rather abysmal rating of 27% from critics and an average 60% audience rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
The film has the primary theme of "ghosting" or "being ghosted" in it, which basically means going radio silent in relationships rather than outright breaking them.
It focuses on a romantically needy farmer, Cole Turner (Evans), who meets a rather mysterious and elusive but lonely woman Sadie Rhodes, (de Armas) on a seemingly normal meet-cute. While they seem to be hitting it off, Sadie, who claims to be an art curator, seemingly begins to ignore Cole's texts after their first date.
However, the plot of Ghosted then soon thickens when Cole arrives in London to surprise Sadie, who everyone has pointed out has "ghosted" him. Cole is then kidnapped by mysterious men who believe that he is a dangerous but legendary CIA agent named "The Taxman".
Cole is rescued by Sadie, who reveals that she is a CIA operative and the two go on a rollicking adventure filled with high action and a lot of stakes. They are chased by hitmen, criminals, and various people belonging to the shady world of masks, disguises, and deception.
Disclaimer: The following article contains slight spoilers from Ghosted.
Ghosted is nothing more than your run-of-the-mill action romantic comedy
At both first glance and in its depth, Ghosted is nothing more than just your average action romantic comedy. It eschews all the drama, nonsense, and craziness that one would expect from the genre. It has everything that was previously showcased in films such as Mr. & Mrs. Smith, Knight & Day, This Means War, and Bounty Hunter.
However, here the gender roles are reversed. Instead of females being traditionally depicted as romantically needy, and men being emotionally unavailable, the man Chris Evans' Cole is romantically needy. Meanwhile his love interest Ana de Armas' Sadie is emotionally distant and more focused on her CIA duties.
The plot of the film is also rather very dry and like most action romantic comedies, is very one-dimensional and simple and has no complexities whatsoever. The characters also seem like cookie cutters and have little to no depth whatsoever.
The film basically has this plot that goes through multiple phases from Point A to Point B. Guy falls in love with a mysterious girl, tries flirting with and wooing her, fails multiple times, and eventually wins her heart. It also gets muddled as it tries and fails to balance all the elements of romance, comedy, and action in its 1-hour 56-minute runtime.
The screenplay of the film is very formulaic. The writer's team of Paul Wernick, Rhett Reese, Chris McKenna, and Erik Sommers, offer nothing new and unique to the genre. They seem to only have put out all the expected cliches, action, drama, and tension, which one would expect in an action romantic comedy.
Of the four, Wernick and Reese are known for their work in Deadpool films while McKenna and Sommers are known for their contributions to Tom Holland's Spider-Man trilogy.
The script is also rather poor in the sense that the little moments in the film that seem very heartwarming and cute are lost in all the action and spectacle. Additionally, Reese, Wernick, McKenna, and Sommers also make the mistake of constantly telling and not showing.
For example, throughout the film, multiple characters constantly point out how obvious the attraction between Cole and Sadie is. Characters repeatedly tell two to get a room whenever there is some tension between them.
Chris Evans and Ana de Armas have great individual performances in Ghosted but seem to lack chemistry
As for the performances in Ghosted, they are great individually. Chris Evans delivers a rather decent and solid performance as the romantically needy and average farmer Cole Turner.
This might remind viewers of his more youthful and energetic performances in films like Fantastic Four, What's Your Number?, Not Another Teen Movie and The Nanny Diaries. However, he also seems to possess a slightly more mature and world-weary tone from his Captain America days.
Ana de Armas once again proves her mettle in the action genre in Ghosted, following No Time To Die and The Gray Man, via her role as Sadie Rhodes. She frequently steals the show and spotlight from Chris Evans, who more or less plays second fiddle to her throughout the story. She also brilliantly portrays her character's more vulnerable side, especially whenever there are mentions of her character's past throughout the film.
Despite Evans and de Armas giving great individual performances, they seem to lack any chemistry. Most of their banter throughout Ghosted feels forced and unexciting. Even during their flirtatious and romantic scenes, there seems to be no spark.
This thus further renders the notion that Scarlett Johansson, who had originally signed on for the film, should have stayed as the second lead. She and Evans have proven to have better chemistry in their previous work together such as The Perfect Score, The Nanny Diaries, and the Marvel films.
Adrien Brody from the Wes Anderson films delivers a very sinister and commanding performance as the main antagonist of Ghosted, Leveque, despite appearing cartoonish at times. However, Brody's performance seems to be hampered by the writing as he does not appear to be as threatening and menacing as he is supposed to be.
Fans of the Marvel films, especially the Captain America films, will be in for a treat as there are special cameos from Anthony Mackie and Sebastian Stan in Ghosted. The cameos humorously act as a reference to Chris Evans' past portrayal of Captain America in the MCU.
Ghosted is currently streaming on Apple TV+. The film was produced by Apple Studios in collaboration with Skydance Media.
