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- Spenser, an ex-cop and ex-con, teams up with aspiring fighter Hawk to uncover a sinister conspiracy tied to the deaths of two Boston police officers.
www.netflix.com/Title/81005492
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It was released on March 6, 2020, by Netflix [2] to mixed reviews. The film marked Arkin's final live-action film appearance, and his second-overall final film appearance (before Minions: The Rise of Gru ) in his lifetime; he died on June 29, 2023.
Spenser Confidential 2020 | Maturity rating: 15 | 1h 51m | Thriller Spenser, an ex-cop and ex-con, teams up with aspiring fighter Hawk to uncover a sinister conspiracy tied to the deaths of two Boston police officers.
Mar 6, 2020 · Who's in Spenser Confidential, and how do you know the main performers? Here's a cast and character guide for Peter Berg's 2020 Netflix film.
- Mark Wahlberg is on the case in this predictable murder-mystery elevated by a solid cast.
- Netflix Spotlight: March 2020
- Verdict
By Jim Vejvoda
Posted: Mar 6, 2020 8:01 am
Mark Wahlberg goes home to the streets of Boston in Spenser Confidential, a Netflix Original Movie inspired by the late Robert B. Parker’s literary private eye and the 1980s TV series Spenser: For Hire. It’s a competently made vehicle for Wahlberg to once again play a Boston tough guy but the movie itself isn’t thrilling or compelling enough to fully click as a murder-mystery, working marginally better as a buddy flick thanks to Wahlberg’s banter with co-star Winston Duke, who plays his newfound ally, Hawk.
Loosely inspired by Ace Atkins’ Spenser novel Wonderland, Spenser Confidential really doesn’t require any previous knowledge of either the books or the TV show to understand it. Even if you do have such knowledge the film makes so many changes to fit Spenser to Wahlberg’s screen persona that it could just as easily not be a Spenser story at all. This film — which reunites Wahlberg with director Peter Berg for the fifth time — follows ex-cop Spenser as he readjusts to life after a few years in prison for assaulting his former commanding officer. No sooner has he returned to South Boston than Spenser learns that very same cop has been executed. Spenser has an alibi but when another cop shows up dead the conspiracy widens. Driven by both his innate curiosity and strong moral code, Spenser quickly gets on the bad side of dirty cops, street gangs, and the city’s power brokers in his pursuit to bring justice.
The whole mystery that the movie hinges on has all the stakes of standard ‘80s/‘90s crime thrillers or countless TV procedurals. You can identify exactly whodunit and why from the get-go so you spend the next 100 minutes going through the motions to get to a conclusion that was obvious from Act One. The action scenes are fine if uninspired; the best parts being seeing Wahlberg’s Spenser getting his ass handed to him by various groups of toughs or, in one of the more amusing sequences, a guard dog. Even though it’s firmly established that Spenser is a trained boxer, the use of Wahlberg as a punching bag is a fun recurring gag throughout the film.
While the mechanics of the murder mystery element of Spenser Confidential are formulaic, at least the personalities of the cast help elevate the other aspects of the movie into something a bit more engaging. As Hawk, Winston Duke forgoes the stone-cold delivery made famous by Avery Brooks on Spenser: For Hire in favor of playing him as a giant who eats greens and drinks oat milk, hipster habits totally foreign to Spenser. Duke’s Hawk may be kinder and gentler than his TV predecessor but he also makes the character far more real and accessible than Brooks’ more cartoonish but way cooler incarnation.
(It should also be noted that the original Spenser was a thoughtful soul who loves poetry and quotes famous authors; the closest Wahlberg’s Spenser gets to that is being called “bookworm” in the prison library for reading up on tractor-trailer trucks. Also, Spenser wasn’t a Boston native like Wahlberg’s version.)
Other supporting players include Alan Arkin doing his best Alan Arkin impression as Spenser and Hawk’s curmudgeonly benefactor Henry, while comedian Iliza Shlesinger proves an underutilized scene-stealer as Spenser’s brash ex-flame, Cissy. Cissy may be a cliche Tough Boston Girl but at least she generates some laughs at the tough guys’ expense. Wahlberg, Duke, Arkin, and Shlesinger all have a fun chemistry together that a stronger and more engaging story would have helped showcase all the more.
Those familiar with either the literary or TV incarnations of Spenser may not find much to recognize or truly appreciate in this Netflix movie but to the layperson, Spenser Confidential is an unchallenging but still mildly entertaining time-passer, the streaming movie equivalent of a JFK-to-LAX page-turner. It’s a completely journeyman-like flick, ...
Mar 6, 2020 · Based on the Robert B. Parker novel Wonderland, “Spenser Confidential” stars Mark Wahlberg as a Boston cop who plays by his own rules. As the opening of this flummoxing film reveals, his rules include beating the hell out of a commanding officer because you suspect he beats his wife.
Mar 6, 2020 · With the new Netflix action-comedy 'Spenser Confidential,' Mark Wahlberg and Peter Berg refashion author Robert Parker's private eye for the 21st century.
