Rating 6/10
A wartime relic from the Blitz becomes the fuse for something far more dangerous.
Say hello to another heist thriller that aspires to the pantheon of classics, alongside Heat and Inside Man. Fuze takes its title from military and explosives terminology, hinting at a device engineered and ready to detonate. Get ready for twisty suspense where one wrong move could set everything off. David Mackenzie (Hell or High Water) is a proven director who sets the expectation for a character-driven story. In this saga, the people matter as much as the crime itself. The cast includes Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Theo James, Gugu Mbatha-Raw, and Sam Worthington, a group of proven actors who may not be traditional box office draws but bring the kind of intensity a premise like this needs. I had high hopes.
It all begins with a discovery that brings London to a halt. An unexploded WWII bomb is uncovered in the heart of the capital. The city is brought to a standstill as an Explosive Ordnance Disposal (EOD) technician, Major Will Tranter (Aaron Taylor-Johnson), races against the clock to prevent catastrophe. Overseeing the escalating crisis is Chief Superintendent Zuzana (Gugu Mbatha-Raw), coordinating a tense operation across the evacuation zone.
Ah, but that’s only the beginning. In the shadow of the lockdown, Karalis (Theo James) is a career thief who orchestrates a bank robbery amidst the chaos. A loyal enforcer supports him, the imposing X (Sam Worthington). On the ground, Sergeant Dootsie Keane (Saffron Hocking) is part of the military unit tasked with containing the threat. As this unfolds, Rahim (Elham Ehsas) is an Afghan immigrant living in London. He and his elderly parents get caught up in the evacuation. What begins as a race to defuse a threat quickly spirals into a perilous clash between the authorities trying to contain a disaster and criminals exploiting it in real time.
Fuze works because it keeps reinventing its own plot. Just as you settle in, it shifts gears to keep your attention. At first, it plays like a straight bomb-disposal thriller, tight and procedural, all about whether Major Will Tranter can defuse the explosive before it blows up. Then it pivots into a heist movie, with Karalis and his crew exploiting the chaos in a way that feels both clever and opportunistic. And just when you think you’ve settled into that rhythm, it shifts again. The drama involves a puzzle of overlapping loyalties and shifting allegiances.
It’s one of those “who are we even rooting for?” movies, where the lines between good guys and bad guys blur. And it totally works in the moment. The constant shifting of perspective keeps the narrative moving, unpredictable, and entertaining as you watch.
But once it’s over, it dissolves into a shrug. The mechanics are clever, sure, but they’re also preposterous. The whole thing hinges on a chain of coincidences and perfectly executed decisions that only work if you don’t look at them too closely. It’s about characters being in exactly the right place at exactly the right moment. I went with it. I suspended disbelief, bought into the ride, and had a good enough time. That surprised me. Perhaps somewhere along with the stolen diamonds, it also swiped my sense of reason.
04-20-26