G20 (AMAZON PRIME) (2025)

SYNOPSIS: When the G20 summit comes under siege, U.S. President Danielle Sutton (Academy Award® winner Viola Davis) becomes the number one target. After evading capture by the attackers, she must outsmart the enemy to protect her family, defend her country and safeguard world leaders in this action-packed thrill ride. 

MOVIE REVIEW:

G20 basically takes a leaf out of Olympus Has Fallen and turned it into a Viola Davis action vehicle. The premise is simple. Assemble the world’s biggest leaders in a room where they are held hostage by an ex-soldier, Corporal Rutledge (Antony Starr) while the baddies crash the world’s economy by making billions in cryptocurrency. Throws in a tough female President Sutton played by Davis and viola you have G20!

It’s impossible not to compare G20 with the Fallen series and White House Down since they all involved the American President and a powerful ally, their bodyguard of sort. Viola Davis who has shown she can kick serious asses in The Woman King plays an ex-decorated soldier turned President. There’s nothing else we know about her character except she has a loving husband, Derek (Anthony Anderson), a son named Demetrius (Christopher Farrar) and a rebellious tech-savvy daughter, Serena (Marsai Martin). Throughout the ordeal, her army colleague turned bodyguard, Manny (Ramón Rodríguez) dutifully covers her back.

As if to raise the stakes, the rest of the family members get to grace the screen at times. Derek suffers a few bloody punches while Serena expectedly gets to show off her tech skills. To be fair, G20 isn’t terrible in trying to hold your attention. Because for one, Viola Davis is an engaging performer and we really want to see her taking out the bad guys. Laughingly, most of the rugged, stout men especially the last henchman of Rutledge hardly caused much damages to President Sutton anyway.

Set and filmed in South Africa, G20 clearly suffers from the lack of a generous budget. Most of the CG and background looks cartoonish though fortunately, most of the action took place indoors. Fight coordinator Filip Ciprian Florian who worked with Viola on The Woman King delivers some fierce punches and kicks but nothing too memorable or fancy to get action fans excited. And if you are expecting Antony Starr from The Boys to play a brilliant madman. Nope. His character is yet another cliched villain who wishes nothing but to watch the world burn.

The biggest problem however is not the run out of mill story but the consequence of releasing this sort of so-called action blockbuster to streaming. Imagine the future of cinema where most movies will not even get the attention of consumers since most are fed on mediocre home entertainment. Anyway G20 is a forgettable Amazon Prime release. The overall experience is serviceable on TV and slightly above those direct-to-video production.

MOVIE RATING:

Review by Linus Tee