Late period Russell Crowe seems to have minimal filmmaking ambitions, and I gotta say, I kind of respect it. At 59 years old, the former heartthrob of Gladiator and The Insider has filled out around the middle and now appears as if he might simply be keener on devoting his life to his lust for maps than starring in good films. Crowe’s next few projects include movies called Sleeping Dogs, The Georgetown Project and, most excitingly, another Sony Spider-Man Universe installment playing a guy named “Nikolai Kravinoff.” That’s fine. The way I see it, if you’ve given the world Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World, then you should be able to use your autumn years to explore your weird niche interests in peace, and not worry about the way your late-period oeuvre stacks up against the first two-thirds or so. We may never get The Nice Guys 2, no, but we do get photos of Russell Crowe zooming around in a little moped scooter and, quite honestly, both bring me equal amounts of joy. And it’s not like Crowe phones it in either; at least, not in Land of Bad, where he plays Captain Eddie “Reaper” Grimm, a drone pilot for the U.S. Air Force who doesn’t get no respect around there.
Reaper is a charmingly cantankerous, meticulous guy who’s been married four times, with eight kids and a new one currently en route to the world on the same day as Reaper’s next mission. The plan? A U.S. Army Delta Force team has boots on the ground in the Philippines to rescue a CIA agent, who’s been captured by one of the many extremist groups in the area of the Sulu Sea of Southern Asia. As is helpfully reminded to us by a title card at the beginning of Land of Bad, we (the U.S., I guess) are apparently always at war even when humble citizens like you and I don’t even realize it. That title card sets up the vibe for a film that is flagrant military propaganda at worst and, at best, not the worst thing in the world.
The U.S.A. vs. Evil Brown Terrorists. Cowboys vs. Indians. Same old, same old. Land of Bad is, however, a strange 180 for director William Eubank, whose last two projects were a seventh Paranormal Activity movie and a deep-sea thriller starring Kristen Stewart. I suppose when those kinds of films don’t bring home the bacon, perhaps one must pivot to appealing to the patriot contingent. But what do I know? I mean, I literally don’t know anything. I’m just typing words on my little keyboard.
So, Land of Bad: A ridiculously-titled film that aligns with the arm tattoos sported by one of the Delta Force team members, Sergeant Bishop (Ricky Whittle), pertaining to war being “the land of bad,” which sounds like something a toddler might say. Bishop, along with his three compatriots Master Sergeant John “Sugar” Sweet (Milo Ventimiglia), Sergeant JJ “Playboy” Kinney—our protagonist—and Sergeant Abel (these latter two played by Hemsworth Brothers 2 and 3, Liam and Luke, respectively), drop from a helicopter into the jungle in order to track down and scope out the compound where their target is located. But when the terrorists execute the target’s wife and aim to do the same to their young son, protection of the child takes precedence over the mission and the team exposes themselves in a blaze of gunfire. Battle with the terrorists renders Abel KIA, Sugar and Bishop MIA, and absolutely no word of what happened to the kid that they saved other than we see him run off into the jungle. Hopefully he doesn’t get eaten.
Alone in the unforgiving wilderness, Playboy is forced to fend for himself with nothing but the guidance in his ear from Reaper and his partner Staff Sergeant Nia Branson (Chika Ikogwe). Reaper faces his own issues back home—he’s an older Captain at the behest of his shitheel younger Colonel (Daniel MacPherson), who’s more interested in watching a basketball game with the rest of the squadron. Reaper forms a connection with Playboy as he attempts to guide the young man to safety, revealing more of his backstory as the two bond with one another over their shared Ohio lineage. But just when things turn crucial in the extraction mission, Reaper is removed from his post by the cocksure Colonel for going over hours, relegated to wandering supermarket aisles in search of the previously bemoaned vegan products that Reaper’s pregnant wife requires. That ties into the strange, conflicting politics of the film, in which characters espouse a dislike of usual left-leaning archetypes like Mouthy Vegans and Commies, yet there’s still a textual distaste conveyed for your standard government authoritarianism.
Perhaps Land of Bad, co-written by Eubank and David Frigerio, is neither right nor left but a secret, third thing: Libertarian. But this mistrust towards authority is coupled by another interesting thematic wrinkle. Towards the beginning of the film, Bishop laments newfangled tech that won’t save soldiers when it’s down to Man vs. Man. Yet, lo and behold, it is drone technology that saves Bishop and Playboy in the end. Who could’ve seen that coming based on a very prolonged and awkward conversation between two characters that overtly reads as foreshadowing. Land of Bad is a very weird type of pro-war film I’ve never seen before that is explicitly pro-drone. Where would our glorious country be without drones helping to bring our boys home and deliver Amazon packages? Still, that isn’t to say war propaganda movies can possess zero redeeming artistic factors (sometimes they can even be as good as Top Gun: Maverick!): Land of Bad’s cinematographer Agustin Claramunt does shoot some striking sequences along the beach at dawn and in the grimy, Hostel-esque terrorist cave prisons.
Nevertheless, Land of Bad is middle-of-the-road war movie gobbledygook. The fight scenes ensue like visual salad bereft of choreographic poetry, with jarring hand-held or swerving cameras, the sequences cut as if to intentionally confuse us and dull our senses. The narrative and characters are boilerplate, and there is very little impressive or memorable aside from the big Hawaiian shirt Russell Crowe wears. Playboy eventually does do climactic battle against the Evil Brown Terrorist who is evil and ruthless and unredemptive, and it is up to the brave American Boy to stop him and save the day. Spoiler alert: He does, but he couldn’t have done it without the help of the disrespected but always honorable drone operative. At the end of the day, the perpetually disgruntled Crowe as Reaper is the film’s saving grace. It’s a pleasure to watch the A-lister mumble through lines about misplaced Keurig pods, and watch him trundle peacefully through grocery aisles in a sequence comically juxtaposed against Playboy as he fights for his damn life. Like the beacon of hope that drone technology provides for the U.S. military, all you can do when you watch a movie like Land of Bad is just hope to God that it’s helping to fund Crowe’s passion for maps.
Director: William Eubank
Writer: David Frigerio, William Eubank
Starring: Liam Hemsworth, Russell Crowe, Luke Hemsworth, Ricky Whittle, Milo Ventimiglia
Release Date: February 16, 2024
Brianna Zigler is an entertainment writer based in middle-of-nowhere Massachusetts. Her work has appeared at Little White Lies, Film School Rejects, Thrillist, Bright Wall/Dark Room and more, and she writes a bi-monthly newsletter called That’s Weird. You can follow her on Twitter, where she likes to engage in stimulating discussions on films like Movie 43, Clifford, and Watchmen.