Project Power is one of Netflix’s latest releases and stars Jamie Foxx and Joseph Gordon-Levitt as a man on a mission to save his daughter who is being experimented on, and a cop respectively. The film also centers around a drug that can give the user temporary powers for five minutes. The movie is said to appeal to fans who loved Bright with Will Smith.
Audiences have been on the super-power hype train for years now, and when you add Jamie Foxx and Joseph Gordon-Levitt to a movie about superpowers it usually works well, right? Yes and no. Oh, and consider this an official spoiler warning if you haven’t watched Project Power yet.
Loved: Jamie Foxx
Jamie Foxx stars as Art, the main protagonist who is on a mission to find his daughter for the entirety of the movie. It turns out his daughter is patient zero for the power-enabling drugs of the movie’s universe, and she is being held by the company who makes the drugs: Teleios.
Jamie Foxx provides a compelling performance as Art and you really buy into the relationship and love he has for his daughter. No surprise from Jamie Foxx who is a wonderful actor, even in not so wonderful projects.
Hated: The Villain
It seems as though Netflix were hellbent on making the company, Teleios, as evil as they could without putting a lot of thought into what made sense. The evil multinational organization behind the drugs was holding people captive to test the drug, but they were also dealing them on the streets which would attract a lot of unwanted attention. Randomly giving the drugs out on the street seems like a lousy way to conduct/monitor a test.
Why did they take Jamie Foxx’s daughter if they knew he also had powers? Some of this may be nitpicking, but these are just a few examples of questions related to the antagonist that fans had since the film’s release.
Loved: A Different Take On Superpowers
For the last decade, comic book fans have been fed with so many movies surrounding aliens, metahumans, and rich vigilantes. Project Power takes a different spin by giving the user of a drug temporary powers for five minutes. Your power is always the same but some people can die straight away if their body can’t handle the mutation, adding an extra layer to the intensity.
With all the above being true, it is explained in the movie that you must first twist the pill to activate it. What happens if you don’t twist the capsule? Why do you have to twist it? Some fans are still pondering over these questions that could have been easily explained with a few simple lines of dialogue.
Hated: The Powers
The movie was saturated with super-powers left, right, and center, which is always fun for audiences to see. However, there was only one power that seemed unique and that was the chameleon ability of one small villain.
The other abilities seen throughout the movie were very cliché abilities: hardened skin, healing ability, frost powers, fire powers, hulk-like strength and size, etc. While all these powers were fun to see and used well, perhaps the sequel— and yes fans are hoping for one— could focus on lesser-known, more cliché abilities.
Loved: Joseph Gordon-Levitt
Levitt, like Foxx, is a powerhouse actor that has been great in many of his projects. Gordon-Levitt stars alongside Foxx as Frank Shaver, a cop who tracks down Art but eventually helps him to find his daughter. There was no overcomplication of his character, he was a cop who took down bad guys and took the pill to give him rock hard skin to help him do so.
The only issue with Shaver was some overly cringy dialogue but none of that can be attributed to Gordon-Levitt himself, and the dialogue that was cringy, he managed to pull off.
Hated: The Story
This is an element that is becoming a common theme amongst many Netflix properties. The story was fairly lackluster and cliché. By the first 15-20 minutes, you could tell what was going to happen by the end. They were going to find and rescue his daughter, Jamie Foxx was going to use the pill, as it was leading up to his big power reveal at the end.
It could be argued that this story would have been better in a 10-12 episode series instead of crammed into just under 2 hours.
Loved: Dominique Fishback
Dominique Fishback played Robin in Project Power and did so wonderfully. Robin was a dealer of the drug herself but also a friend of Shavers’. She comes across Art in the search for his daughter and there is good chemistry between Art and Robin throughout the movie.
We’d also love to see more of Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Dominique Fishback in a Batman and Robin-type sequel.
Hated: The Rap Battle
Let it be known that this has nothing to do with Fishback’s acting or performance. Dominique Fishback’s character was revealed to be a freestyle rapper during one scene where she rapped about her teacher and another where Foxx’s character urged her to rap for him.
The “freestyle” rap in the scene with the teacher came across as very rehearsed and the whole story of her being a freestyle rapper felt very random and out of place. She also hated rapping in front of people, to add another interesting layer to an unneeded character arc.
Loved: The Special Effects
The visual effects team that worked on Project Power went into a lot of detail when working on this movie. Everything from the energy inside the drug capsule, which audiences got a close up look at, to the eyes of the users, looked fantastic.
The powers in general from the chameleon, and the woman with the ice powers to Gordon-Levvit’s hardened skin and Jamie Foxx’s heatwaves all looked fantastic.
Hated: The Third Act
As mentioned before, the movie as a whole seemed very predictable, and therefore the third act played out exactly like most viewers thought it would. Art’s daughter was saved and the company creating the drugs was taken down.
Netflix also saved Jamie Foxx’s power reveal for the very end, making audiences wait. Fans then learned that Foxx could emit massive heatwaves from his body in a scene that looked visually spectacular, but felt very underwhelming as it was a three-minute scene of Jamie Foxx screaming, flailing, and burning everything in sight.
