Aaron Taylor-Johnson & Theo James Give This Predictable Heist Thriller The Warmth It Wants

In David McKenzie’s propulsive thriller Fuze, everybody’s ready for a bomb to go off. At a development web site in central London, staff have uncovered what appears to be like to be a WWII-era explosive and the world is instantly cordoned off and evacuated. Main Will Tranter is overseeing the excavation and dismantling of the bomb and Aaron Taylor-Johnson provides the character a cheeky aptitude, even in probably the most dire of circumstances.

Because the army and police are attempting to include the radius of injury, simply down the road, a gaggle of males led by Theo James is within the midst of a financial institution heist. The 2 occasions are clearly linked, however the thrust of Fuze is slowly revealing how (and why) a decades-old bomb and a South African diamond thief are intertwined.

Although Fuze typically has the air of a direct-to-video characteristic, McKenzie’s dead-serious tackle the fabric and the pure star energy (Sam Worthington and Gugu Mbatha-Uncooked additionally seem) give the movie a much-needed increase. It isn’t as intricately plotted because it thinks it’s, however it’s nonetheless a well-made thriller.

Fuze Is Led By An All-Star Solid & David McKenzie’s Assured Course

Although sides are drawn early on, as Fuze untangles its varied threads, the road between villain and hero blurs. On one facet is Taylor-Johnson’s Tranter, a not-too-serious military man who is thought for bucking towards authority and doing issues his personal means. He pours a spherical of photographs even earlier than they defuse the bomb, anticipating his group’s eventual victory, no matter that will seem like.

Fuze begins with Tranter and the remainder of London’s police power (led by Mbatha-Uncooked’s formidable Zuzana) evacuating the blast space and securing the perimeter, however slowly expands outward to disclose a bigger prison conspiracy. Simply while you assume Fuze has all of it laid out, Ben Hopkins’ script switches issues up, introducing us to Karalis (James), a sharp-tongued financial institution robber together with his personal agenda.

Utilizing the bomb as a canopy for the heist and his reducing South African accent as a weapon towards the grunts doing the soiled work, James is having a helluva good time taking part in a villain. Worthington is his right-hand man (or so it appears), however because the heist continues and the efforts to dismantle the bomb develop more and more fraught, extra questions come to the fore.

Is the bomb actually from the Blitz? What’s Karalis’s actual agenda, and what was within the secure deposit field that he singled out? Fuze may be predictable because it solutions these questions, and its plot turns into a bit convoluted. However that does not make it any much less thrilling when the bomb is revealed because the distraction it was all the time meant to be.

McKenzie, maybe finest identified for Hell or Excessive Water, however who additionally premiered his final movie Relay at TIFF, by no means lets Fuze accept too lengthy. Acquainted dynamics, like that of the army group overseeing the bomb, are underscored by unpredictable ones. The true nature of the connection between Karalis and the lads who’re serving to him is the one that continues to be most unpredictable.

However that is in the end the difficulty with Fuze — as soon as the financial institution heist is launched, the bomb plot loses its edge, the dynamics of the army group undermined by that of the shifty squad shaking down secure deposit bins. This paranoia provides Fuze the power it must push ahead even because it turns into unwieldy. Fortunately, Fuze in the end subverts endings typical of flicks like this, touchdown on a word that’s weirdly satisfying for the way irregular it feels.

Fuze might not reinvent the wheel, however typically all you want is a stable thriller with a sizzling solid to essentially give a movie the oomph it wants.

Fuze premiered on the 2025 Toronto Worldwide Movie Competition.