Shaft

Samuel L. Jackson’s John Shaft returns in this underwhelming action comedy, with the narrative following the iconic character as he agrees to help his estranged son (Jessie Usher’s JJ) solve the murder of a close friend (Avan Jogia’s Karim). Filmmaker Tim Story admittedly does an effective job of initially drawing the viewer into the proceedings, as Shaft, which boasts an engaging, time-spanning opening-credits sequence, benefits from a first act that seems to have purposefully been infused with an agreeable ’90s thriller-type feel – with the mindless yet watchable vibe heightened by Usher’s charismatic turn as the younger Shaft. (Jackson, on the other hand, doesn’t fare nearly as well, as the actor, saddled with never-not-distracting makeup designed to disguise his age, delivers a disappointingly lazy and head-scratchingly homophobic performance that remains a far cry from his best work.) And although the persistent inclusion of needless levity is a consistent annoyance, Shaft doesn’t begin its radical downfall until it moves into a midsection that grows more and more tedious as time progresses – with the aggressive emphasis on tedious subplots and the Shafts’ dull, by-the-numbers investigation paving the way for a padded-out and downright boring climax. It’s ultimately difficult to label Shaft as anything less than a completely misbegotten exercise in irrelevance, and it seems unlike that, despite a fairly laughable final sequence, that further installments in this underwhelming series will be forthcoming.

*1/2 out of ****

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