It has been seven years since Shane Black’s last film, the muddled misfire that was franchise-revival-attempt The Predator. Play Dirty feels like course correction. Yes, obviously, it’s set at Christmas time — good luck finding a film in his catalogue that isn’t — but there are other familiar hallmarks of the writer-director here, too: deadpan dialogue, dead bodies as punchlines, a hard-boiled throwback tone and a smoky score to boot. It’s nowhere near the high-water mark of the man who was once the world’s best-paid screenwriter — but maybe this is enough, for now.
This is the latest adaptation of the Parker novel series by Donald E Westlake, a natural fit for someone of Black’s sensibilities. Somewhat like Lee Child’s Jack Reacher, Parker is a coldly efficient tough-guy character who has spawned many books but enjoyed mixed results on the screen; unlike Reacher, Parker is a prolific professional robber and all-round scoundrel. “I stole something and I got away with it,” is all the backstory we get on this guy in the film, and there’s something refreshing about how uncomplicated and to-the-point the character is, living by a simple if occasionally murderous code.
As Parker, Mark Wahlberg plays him with matching efficiency and a kind of grumpy impatience, getting the job done while never quite finding the charm or charisma of previous Shane Black leading men (Robert Downey Jr, a producer here, was previously tapped to star). We first meet Parker in the midst of a medium-stakes robbery; when he is betrayed, our anti-hero sets out for revenge — and a much bigger take. So begins an elaborate and messy heist involving a priceless statue that also, somehow, involves regime change in a South American country.
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