Halle Berry and Mark Wahlberg Led “The Union” Could Have Been So Much Better – Movie Review

Even though I’m a big fan of Halle Berry, I knew what kind of movie The Union was likely going to be. It’s a Netflix offering, after all. But frankly, I wasn’t expecting it to be as… well, let’s just say I wanted it to be far more than merely serviceable considering the cast.

SPOILER WARNING! Proceed carefully!

The Union isn’t a bad spy action movie. But it’s also not a very good one either. What frustrated me the most about the flick was that it had the ingredients to be a lot better than what was shown. However, the creative team decided not to tap into the narrative’s full potential.

The premise is simple enough. Berry’s Roxanne Hall works for a secret organization called The Union. It’s basically an agency tasked with handling certain missions the CIA doesn’t want to get involved in. The Union members are the ones who get their hands dirty and play a role in keeping the world moving.

A major event at the beginning of the movie involves a major risk of the personal details of spies, military personnel, etc. getting leaked. This drives Roxanne to reach out to her high school ex-boyfriend Mike McKenna (Mark Wahlberg) because the agency wants someone their enemy wouldn’t notice. Mike’s your average guy living away his years in his hometown. Reuniting with Roxanne sends him on a global chase to retrieve the sensitive data that can put the lives of numerous spies and similar people in mortal danger.

The biggest misstep in the script deals with the audience never being told why Roxanne wanted Mike to handle such an important mission in the first place. It’s not as if he’s got any special skills. Apparently, Roxanne remembered Mike’s courage and “potential” from high school, but then again we are never shown any of that onscreen. At least, not in a way that allows Mike to stand out from the rest. I mean, you could swap Mike with any other man who was a jock during his high school years, and I don’t think the story will change much.

Again, the ingredients to have Mike’s involvement in the world of espionage make somewhat credible sense were right there. The script could have easily used Roxanne’s recent loss of a loved one to explain why she wanted to seek out something familiar and having her high school love around gave her a sense of comfort, safety, and control.

But the way Roxanne’s recruitment of Mike was handled made it come across as a professional spy putting the life of a civilian in danger because they shared a past. I can’t believe Roxanne’s boss, Tom Brennan (J. K. Simmons), allowed her to make such a move. 

They could have made it so that Mike witnessed something he wasn’t supposed to and the enemy put a target on his back. So, Roxanne needed to keep him around for his safety.

Again, Mike’s involvement could have been explained so easily. And yet the film wasn’t interested in fleshing out the detail. A detail, mind you, that is crucial to the premise.

Anyway, with Mike being put through a two-week crash course instead of the six months-long training agents usually went through, the action sequences are comprised of Mike trying his best to get out of precarious situations alive. At least Mike being incapable of facing experienced agents, including women, in hand-to-hand combat made sense. His vulnerability as a male lead allowed Roxanne to jump in a bunch of times to save him.

It was so good to see Berry getting into some fun action sequences in the manner she did. The way she slammed an enemy into the ground was so good!

The pacing of the approximately 1 hour and 40 minutes-long movie followed the usual tropes seen in such action spy offerings. We got a training montage. The new recruit’s first mission was a failure. And the team realized there might be a mole amongst them. There’s a lot of double-crossing, which I liked. And even though I had issues with the storytelling, I have to admit that a particular revelation made me go, “WTF?!!”

You got me, The Union writers. You got me there! Points for adding such an unexpected twist.

Wahlberg and Berry do work well as co-stars, and it was nice to see an action film that didn’t give the older male lead a female partner who is decades younger.

As for the comedic elements, it’s not an outright comedic film, but certain dialogue choices made me smile. I can hear Berry say “B*tch” on repeat. There’s just something quite appealing about the way she says it.

Mike finding himself locked in a car trunk during the finale was also funny.

Having said that, the “comedy” involving a much older Mike sleeping with his seventh-grade teacher fell flat for me. That particular creative choice made me very uncomfortable.

Coming back to what could have been improved, I do feel the writers could have spent a bit more time on how Mike’s racist father treated Roxanne when they were younger. More time could have also been spent on Roxanne’s loss and how a certain development later on in the film would impacted her emotionally.

So, yeah. The Union is a serviceable spy action movie serving as yet another addition to Netflix’s ever-expanding library of mediocre films starring famous talent. It just… exists.

The script did leave the door open for a potential sequel. So, let’s see if it’s able to gain enough viewership numbers to warrant being continued. Personally, I wouldn’t mind seeing Berry getting her coin. But I have my fingers crossed that the sequel (if it ever happens) improves on the debut chapter.

The “fixes” The Union could have benefitted from were so easy to do. It was so frustrating to see the creative team not addressing said issues.

Directed by Julian Farino and based on a screenplay by Joe Barton and David Guggenheim, The Union was released on Netflix on August 16, 2024.

Did you watch The Union? What did you think of it?

Let us know.

And now having finished my review, I’m looking forward to seeing Berry star in the survival horror Never Let Go. It will be theatrically released on September 20, 2024. I have my fingers crossed it’s better than The Union because the bar is low enough.

Author: Farid-ul-Haq

Farid has a Double Masters in Psychology and Biotechnology as well as an M.Phil in Molecular Genetics. He is the author of numerous books including Missing in Somerville, and The Game Master of Somerville. He gives us insight into comics, books, TV shows, anime/manga, video games, and movies.

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