Jamie Foxx slays it as it lays in a goofy Vampire Thriller- Topplaywriting
Snoop Dogg and Dave Franco help Foxx protect his neck in Netflixs sun-baked horror comedy. Two years ago, during the first strange vax-less summer of our pandemic discontent, Jamie Foxx was one of several A-list movie stars to land on Netflix: an Oscar winner and longtime box-office stalwart happily slumming in the surprisingly satisfying genre piece Project Power. Power succeeded in part because it knew it was ridiculous — a patently absurd magic-pill thriller elevated by fleshed-out characters like future Judas and the Black Messiah star Dominique Fishbacks wary teenage sidekick, and humid New Orleans atmosphere.
The sun-baked Day Shift leans into a different kind of cartoonish, a big squishy horror comedy with nothing but one-liners and bloodsuckers on deck. Foxx plays the down-but-not-out Bud Jablonski, a man whose job as a pool cleaner in the San Fernando Valley is cover for his real career: slaying vampires. Because Bud is such an incurable rebel, hes no longer welcome in the local union, which means he cant get full-price compensation for his kills — and his exasperated ex-wife (Meagan Good) is ready to decamp to Florida with their young daughter if he cant come up with $10,000 to pay the bills, stat.
To do that, hell need the reluctant assistance of Seth (Dave Franco), an anxious union rep who would far prefer to stay desk-bound, and enough trophy teeth to clear the cash by Monday. This aint Brad Pitt in a leather jacket and some blood raves, Bud lectures Seth after a raid goes awry. Its not Eclipse, its not New Moon. Its not Breaking Dawn Part One. Indeed, its not; How to Get Away With Murders Karla Souza, as the undead real estate agent–slash–vampire queen bent on taking over the Valley, makes for an oddly bland villain, a fanged Real Housewife in a red power suit, and the great Swedish character actor Peter Stormare is mostly wasted as a skeevy pawnbroker type. But Snoop Dogg, urban-cowboy braids down to his waist and machine guns swinging, has laconic, lightly stoned fun as Buds fellow hunter Big John (he also has a song on the soundtrack).
Like the starry, ludicrous Bullet Train, released last week by John Wick and Atomic Blondes David Leitch, Day Shift is also helmed by a former stunt coordinator, though director J.J. Perry — who first met Foxx as stunt performer on the set of Django Unchained — doesnt so much shape the movie as a punch a hole through it; there are a lot of frantic chopsocky fight scenes filled in with bargain CGI and what looks like Cirque du Soleil-level contortionists, and a lot of jokes that dont quite land (Francos Seth, humiliatingly, wets his pants whenever the threat level reaches red). Shift looks and feels low-budget, from its slapdash effects to its sketched-in script, though that also feels like kind of the point: It might be bright daylight, but its always midnight-movie time somewhere.
Cameron Diaz coming out of retirement for Netflix action-comedy opposite Jamie Foxx. The movie is appropriately titled Back in Action. Only four years after announcing her retirement from acting, shes returning to Hollywood with a new action-comedy movie — appropriately titled Back in Action. Details about the Netflix film are under wraps for now, but we do know that Diaz is starring opposite Jamie Foxx, which marks their third outing as costars after 1999s Any Given Sunday and 2014s Annie remake (Diazs last project before her retirement).
Jamie Foxx, only you could get me back in action!!! Diaz wrote on her Instagram Story. I cant frickin wait its gonna be a blast!
Foxx revealed the news Wednesday on Twitter, sharing an audio recording of his phone call with Diaz. On the call, Diaz says shes excited to return to acting but isnt sure how to go about un-retiring. Lucky for her, Foxx merged the call with someone who knows about making a comeback: Tom Brady, who famously retired from the NFL earlier this year before joining the Tampa Bay Buccaneers a little over a month later.
Back in Action is directed by Seth Gordon (Horrible Bosses), who also penned the script with Brendan OBrien (Neighbors). Foxx is executive producing along with OBrien, Datari Turner, and Mark McNair, with Gordon and Beau Bauman (Central Intelligence) attached to produce. A release date has not yet been set.
In 2018, when Diaz participated in EWs Sweetest Thing reunion with Christina Applegate and Selma Blair, she revealed she was actually retired from acting. Years later, during an appearance on Kevin Harts Peacock talk show Hart To Heart, she said she feels whole after making the decision to step away.
When you do something at a really high level for a really long period of time, theres a lot that — when youre the person whos sort of delivering on this one thing, youre the person on the screen, youre the person whos the talent — everything around you, all parts of you that isnt that, has to be handed off to other people, she said. Its fun to do, I love it, I love acting. I feel like I was really lucky because I had people I worked with for 20 years who I know they have my best interest but for me, I just really wanted to make my life manageable by me. My routine in a day is literally what I can manage to do by myself.
Diaz explained that she realized there were certain parts of her life that she wasnt touching and wasnt managing, and told Hart that stepping away allowed her to do things she wanted to do but hadnt had the chance — like meeting her husband Benji Madden and starting a family. The couple welcomed a daughter, Maddix, in 2019.