Film Pick of the Week: The Rip - by Yvette Huddleston
The Rip Netflix, review by Yvette Huddleston
Working together for the first time in a while, Matt Damon and Ben Affleck prove that their old chemistry is still as potent as ever in this big-budget crime thriller inspired by a true story. They play Miami police colleagues, and close friends, working in the Tactical Narcotics Team who get caught up in a tricky situation when they get a tip-off at the end of a shift to go and pick up a so-called ‘rip’ – a haul of drugs money – from a house in a quiet residential area.
The team is still in shock after the murder of their captain Jackie Velez (Lena Esco); a freeze has been put on overtime and Internal Affairs officers suspect widespread corruption and are conducting invasive interviews. There has been a recent shift in the power dynamic in the team with Dane Dumars (Damon) promoted to lieutenant above his friend Detective Sergeant JD Byrne (Affleck). Although Byrne insists it hasn’t affected their friendship, there appears to be some tension between them.
The team are in low spirits but Dane and JD, along with fellow detectives Mike Ro (Steven Yeun), Numa Baptiste (Teyana Taylor), and Lolo Salazar (Catalina Sandino Moreno) duly go along to the address mentioned in the tip with their trusty sniffer dog to check out the situation. At the house they find a young woman Desi Lopez (Sasha Calle) alone who says the house is her grandmother’s and she has been living there since the old lady died. The property is in probate and she has nowhere else to go. She is reluctant to let them into the house but agrees to a search, saying that they won’t find any drugs in the house. However, her expression changes when she is informed that the dog sniffs out money not narcotics and he is getting very excited indeed, which suggests there is cash somewhere in the building.
And indeed there is. Up in the attic, hidden away behind a false wall in large canisters is around $20million in cash, presumably belonging to the drugs cartels operating in the area. What happens next is puzzling for the team – Dane begins acting strangely; he doesn’t call the haul in straight away and suspicions are aroused about what exactly he is planning… As everyone becomes wary of who they can trust, writer-director Joe Carnahan keeps the action moving along at pace and the intensity and jeopardy high.