black bag review
film by Steven Soderbergh (2025)
When I saw Soderbergh’s last film “Presence” I was surprised how amateur it felt and with little to no substance, its wooden acting and bad writing and overall flat approach. It was unfortunately one of the worst films I have seen this year.
Review by: Aaron Jones | Filed Under: Film Reviews
April 12, 2024
Having no interest in seeing Black Bag because “Presence” just felt failed on so many levels for me, I slowly began to perk up to its potential after reading and hearing so much praise for his rapidly approaching follow-up. Black Bag in my opinion may not suffer as badly from the failures of his previous film, but it is not much of an improvement.
More and more frequently I see this with studio films, and though I avoid more than I actually watch, there is a certain element of emptiness and artificiality that seems to linger over them recently (“Juror #2,” “Blitz,” “A Different Man”) that seems to be increasing its presence—that feels both lazy and synthetic.
The sets look sterile, feeling more like IKEA displays than the lived-in worlds they are meant to represent, descending somewhere past network sitcoms and resting somewhere between them and 50s studio films where the great outdoors is simply a backdrop in an indoor set.
Nothing is convincing me past the point this is simply just a bunch of models playing make-believe while overemphasizing sex appeal. With its promise of neo-noir, I was hoping for a more down-to-earth approach but instead was met with a cacophony of caricatures from the closets of Hollywood, lazy filmmaking, and awful one-liners that felt like Soderbergh is stuck in the 90s—taking some of the worst elements of that decade, repackaging them with a bit of Agatha Christie and James Bond, and looking like a television ad for dark chocolate.
This entire film felt as hollow and wooden as a piece of driftwood, and while I am not much of a person to bash on something, I just can’t see past how absolutely empty this felt amongst its high praise. I am aware that budget plays a big part in some of these observations, but there is also a very juvenile vibe here, bordering on infantile, where its excess just feels a few marks away from superhero and franchise cinema.
I am definitely not the target audience for American studio films or streaming cinema, and this is a perfect example of it—and sadly I think this is the end of me and Soderbergh’s long relationship. I wish you the best, but I am sad to say this is adieu.
Author
Reviewed by Aaron Jones. Based in California, he developed a passion for film from a young age and has since viewed over 10,000 films. His appreciation for the medium led him to film criticism, where he now writes for CinemaWaves, offering analysis of both contemporary releases and timeless classics. In addition to his work here, he has contributed to other publications as well. Feel free to follow him on Instagram and Letterboxd.
Just out of jail, crumpled English archaeologist Arthur reconnects with his wayward crew of tombaroli accomplices – a happy-go-lucky collective of itinerant…
Anora, a young sex worker from Brooklyn, gets her chance at a Cinderella story when she meets and impulsively marries the son of an oligarch. Once the news reaches Russia…
In the near future where emotions have become a threat, Gabrielle finally decides to purify her DNA in a machine that will immerse her in her past lives and rid her…
Neo noir is a contemporary style that draws from the classic film noir genre from the 1940s and 1950s. Classic film noir became known post-World War II, characterized by…
The Vertigo Effect, also known as the “dolly zoom” or “zolly” shot, is a cinematographic technique that creates a disorienting and unsettling visual experience by…
Mise en scène is a French term that means “placing on stage” and encompasses all the visual elements within a frame that contribute to the overall look and feel of a film…