London Calling: Josh Duhamel is a 'Hit-Dad' in a Solid Action-Comedy

By Chris Knight

Rating: B

A solid follow-up from the director/star team of Allan Ungar and Josh Duhamel (2022’s Bandit), London Calling takes road/buddy movie tropes and turns them, if not quite on their heads, then at least disarmingly and sometimes even hilariously askew.

To wit: Tommy Ward (Duhamel) is an American hitman plying his violent trade in London when, thanks to undiagnosed myopia, he offs the wrong target at a costume party. This wouldn’t be so bad — I think movie hitmen have some kind of malpractice insurance — except that the dead man turns out to be the cousin of the wife of local crime boss Freddy Darby (Aidan Gillen).

Now, even that might be forgiven, except that Freddy has both a loose interpretation of “close family,” and a very precise definition of “vengeance.” And so, Tommy must leave his wife and young son in London and head to L.A. (Cape Town subs in for both cities, and very nicely too.)

In his new home, he finds work with Benson (Rick Hoffman), a tracksuit-wearing gangster whose teenaged son Julian is, much to his father’s chagrin, into live-action role-play and video games. Benson decides to kill two birds with one stone (So to speak! Put down that stone!) by having Tommy take the kid on a hit and show him the ropes.

This is where we come to the meat of the movie, with Duhamel’s easygoing character taking Julian under his wing like a second son. OK, so maybe your own father never taught you the eye gouge or how to twirl a handgun, but that’s what hit-dads do, and Tommy proves to be one of the best.

Jeremy Ray Taylor, who has played young’uns in several movies including It (his character is played by Jay Ryan in It: Chapter Two), does a good job as being on the cusp of adulthood. He’s old enough to handle a gun, but still with enough baby-face that Tommy can’t believe bad guys are shooting back.

Of course, much blood will be spilled on the road to maturity. Tommy and Julian find themselves badly impersonating Russians to get close to a target — they both choose the name Boris — and on the run from the target’s aggrieved brother. The latter is certain that if he can get Tommy and Julian to commit suicide, they’ll not only die but also go straight to Hell. (Thanks to Catholic education, I can confirm this.)

Ungar gets great performances from his cast — Hoffman’s Benson is delightfully unhinged — and backs them with some magnificent needle drops, including the toe-tapping 2001 hit “East Side” by Canadian rock band Smoother (the director is Canadian too). And of course, the title track is by The Clash.

This may seem unfair, but I would have bumped my score for “London Calling” up a notch if Ungar’s previous film, Bandit, hadn’t set such a high bar.

That one also starred Duhamel, playing a real-life bank robber who came to Canada in the 1980s, joined Air Canada’s frequent flyer program, and hop-scotched the country knocking over banks and earning the moniker The Flying Bandit.

London Calling is a little more down-to-Earth in every sense. But it’s still an enjoyable crime caper with a soft, squishy heart. It isn’t just the Fast and Furious franchise that knows that at the end of the day, it’s all about family.

London Calling. Directed by Allen Ungar. Starring Josh Duhamel and Jeremy Ray Taylor. In theatres October 7.