Denzel Washington’s Best Action Comedy Is Dominating Netflix
Denzel Washington's 2 Guns action comedy is dominating Netflix.
Denzel Washington is undoubtedly best known for his performances in dramatic pictures like Training Day, Malcolm X, and The Little Things, but that’s not to say he hasn’t dabbled in comedy. In the 2013 flick 2 Guns, the Academy Award-winning actor stars alongside Mark Wahlberg in the Baltasar Kormakur-directed action thriller that’s loaded with just as many wisecracks as it is intense shootouts. With that said, it should come as no surprise the film is absolutely dominating Netflix.
According to Flix Patrol, a website that tracks all movie and television titles climbing the charts on different streaming platforms around the world, 2 Guns is the #1 movie on Netflix. That’s an impressive feat considering the film was only added to the service on February 16. Previously, The Rise of Gru had the top spot locked down but left it to Denzel Washington to overthrow the minions.
2 Guns follows undercover DEA agent Bobby Trench (Denzel Washington) and U.S. Navy intelligence officer Marcus Stigman (Mark Wahlberg), who has been working undercover as members of a narcotics syndicate for the past year. The twist: Neither man knows that the other is an undercover agent. When their attempt to infiltrate a Mexican drug cartel and recover millions goes haywire, the men are disavowed by their superiors, and Trench and Stigman must go on the run lest they wind up in jail or in a grave.
The film is based on the comic book series of the same name created by Steven Grant and Mateus Santolouco, which was published in 2007 by Boom! Studios. In addition to Denzel Washington and Mark Wahlberg, 2 Guns stars Paula Patton, Bill Paxton, Edward James Olmos, Robert John Burke, James Marsden, Greg Sproles, Fred Ward, Patrick Fischler, and Kyle Clements. Baltasar Kormakur, who collaborated with Wahlberg on Contraband a year earlier, directs from a script by Blake Masters.
2 Guns opened to mixed reviews from both professional critics and traditional viewers. The film was criticized for being formulaic and predictable, however, Denzel Washington received heaps of praise for venturing outside of his comfort zone. On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, the film sits with a score of 64 percent off 190 reviews from critics, and from audiences, the movie holds a score of 66 percent off over 100,000 user ratings.
Considering 2 Guns features Denzel Washington in a leading role, nobody was surprised when the film opened at the top of the box office with approximately $27 million in its first weekend. The movie grossed over $75 million domestically and earned another $56 million from international territories for a global haul of nearly $132 million. With a production budget of $61 million, the film was considered a financial success.
While 2 Guns enjoys a second life on streaming, Denzel Washington is gearing up to return to theater screens around the world in The Equalizer 3, which is scheduled to arrive in theaters on September 1. Along with Washington, the threequel stars Dakota Fanning, David Denman, Eugenio Mastrandrea, Sonia Ammar, and Remo Girone. Antoine Fuqua directs from a script by Richard Wenk.
