Weekend Movie Review: 'Men In Black: International' And 'Shaft'

This weekend, the action genre is dominating the big screen, featuring sequels to classic cop film franchises.

Sci-fi comedy "Men in Black: International" stars Chris Hemsworth and Tessa Thompson as an unlikely pair of galactic defenders tasked to investigate an assassination case.

Meanwhile, the detective film "Shaft" returns with a multi-generational spin, starring Samuel L. Jackson, Jessie T. Usher and Richard Roundtree as three generations of the Shaft family, who are brought together to settle an old score.

Here's what to see and what to skip this weekend:

Men in Black: International”— Chris Hemsworth, Tessa Thompson, Liam Neeson; directed by F. Gary Gray

A reboot of the famed 1997 buddy-cop film, “Men in Black: International” is the third collaboration between Chris Hemsworth and Tessa Thompson following their equally colossal adventure films “Thor: Ragnarok” and “Avengers: Endgame.”

As hard-core fans of the original series know, Men In Black (MIB) is a global organization that monitors and polices alien activity around the world, serving as Earth’s first line of defense against alien threats. Mysterious and secretive, their existence is just a “rumor, recognizable only as déjà vu and dismissed just as quickly.”

In the film, Thompson plays Molly, who gets recruited as MIB Agent M after infiltrating the agency without a single trace. In turn, MIB director, Agent O (Emma Thompson), dispatches M to MIB's London headquarters where she partners up with H (Chris Hemsworth), a legendary agent known for his instinctual approach to solving cases.

Their first mission together? H and M will have to investigate the mystery surrounding the death of an alien royal. In their international quest that takes them to Morocco, Paris and Italy, they will cross paths with The Hive, a group of aggressive extra-terrestrials hell bent on obliterating the world.

Can the pair save Earth from threats of extinction?

Skip it. The black suits still look sharp, but not sharp enough to buoy a meandering and lifeless yin-yang screenplay.

Watch the trailer:

“Shaft” — Samuel L. Jackson, Jessie T. Usher, Richard Roundtree; directed by Tim Story

The third chapter of the “Shaft” franchise comes from Tim Story’s latest outing, a multi-generational cop film featuring Jessie T. Usher as JJ Shaft, Samuel L. Jackson as JJ’s dad, John Shaft, and Richard Roundtree as JJ’s grandfather, the family’s patriarch, John Shaft, Sr.

The new film opens with a flashback to 1989 on a street in Harlem, where Maya (Regina Hall), the love of John Shaft’s life, reaches her breaking point after surviving three hitmen dispatched to kill Shaft (Jackson). In the process, she leaves Shaft behind, taking her son, JJ, away with her.

Fast forward to 2019, JJ (Usher) is now an MIT graduate, who has never met his father — that is, until JJ’s best friend’s untimely death brings them together, along with JJ’s grandfather, John Shaft Sr. (Roundtree), to solve the mystery surrounding the murder.

Skip it. Overall, the jokes feel somewhat distasteful, notwithstanding the engaging chemistry between the three leads.

Watch the trailer:

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