Matchbox: The Movie Review - Is This What It Takes To Get A Movie Made These Days?

Published Oct 8, 2026, 12:00 PM EDT

Alex is the Senior Editor of Reviews & Prestige Content, overseeing ScreenRant's film reviews as one of its Rotten Tomatoes-approved critics. After graduating from Brown University with a B.A. in English, he spent a locked-down year in Scotland completing a Master's in Film Studies from the University of Edinburgh, which he hears is a nice, lively city. He now lives in and works from Milan, Italy, conveniently a short train ride from the Venice Film Festival, which he first covered for SR in 2024.

I could describe Matchbox: The Movie to you in two ways. The first is simply through its premise: A group of childhood friends reunite one night for drinks with the long-lost member who moved away from their small town when they were all still in middle school. Turns out, that friend grew up to be an Ethan Hunt-type super spy – something they learn the hard way when he's framed for hijacking a nuclear bomb, and they're all inadvertently identified as accomplices. Now, that collection of normies have to play secret agent and, you know, try not to die.

For the second, I have to go back to when Barbie made over $1.4 billion in 2023, and studio executives everywhere took this as a sign to go all-in on toys. This movie is a product of that gold rush: a feature-film IP exploitation of Mattel's Matchbox, the decades-old toy vehicle brand. That childhood friend group? They called themselves the Matchbox Gang, on account of how they always went to play with Matchbox cars after school. One of their kindly uncles, who owned a scrapyard, had a huge collection. As adults, they work jobs that require operating notable vehicles, and on their surprise spy adventure, they may or may not get to drive the specific ones they once played with as kids.

One of these sounds like a fun action-comedy, the other like a feature-length commercial. Matchbox: The Movie is hardly the first film tasked with being both, especially in recent years, and that needle is hardly impossible to thread. Barbie certainly did it. But what I still can't decide is whether this movie is the first saddled with the baggage of the second, or the second that sometimes manages to feel like the first. In either case, it's a shame that I have to spend the action set pieces and comedic bits trying to keep my enthusiasm from turning to ash in my mouth.

Matchbox's Painful, IP-Driven Beginning Badly Wounds The Movie

The opening prologue featuring the Matchbox Gang as children is (mercifully) brief, but it leaves a lasting impact. Young Sean Walker (Graham Harvey) has seemingly finally built up the courage to tell Aimee (Reagan Marum) that he likes her, having procured exactly the limited-edition toy car that she's always said she wanted. Her uncle Smalley (the most egregious waste of Bill Camp I've ever seen), the scrapyard owner, gives him a pep talk of sorts by recounting the Matchbox origin story while bathed in a nostalgic glow. But when the moment comes, Sean chokes, and he learns immediately after that his father has accepted a job in Chicago. He's lost his chance.

Over 20 years later, Sean (John Cena) is on a mission for a super-secret group within the CIA. He's stolen a nuclear warhead from some undesirables and, with no small amount of vehicular heroism, safely gets it to their smuggler contact. Helen (Danai Gurira), his friend and handler, tells him to lie low for a while, something he hardly knows how to do anymore. But some unexpected news catches his eye: Smalley has died. Despite having essentially forsaken a personal life to work his dangerous job, he decides to go back to his hometown for the funeral.

There, he catches up with all his old friends. Aimee (Jessica Biel), an EMT who does a little racing on the side; Ted (Arturo Castro), a science teacher and family man; and Crosby (Sam Richardson) and Charmaine (Teyonah Parris), who, in addition to working construction and being an eye-in-the-sky traffic reporter, respectively, ended up getting married. They all have a few drinks, enjoy their time, and engage in some aggressive product placement for a selection of non-Matchbox sponsors. But, after downing spiked shots, they all wake up bound in the back of a plane by Mosier (Corey Stoll), the CIA's Deputy Director. The smuggler claims the nuke was never delivered. Sean is suspected of stealing it – and his old friends are believed to have helped him do it.

It strikes such a false note, and strikes it with such force, that it's very tough to shake.

From this point on, Matchbox's IP overlay is not nearly as thick, and director Sam Hargrave (Extraction) gets down to the action comedy he really wanted to make. But I sat through the beginning with gritted teeth. I don't really begrudge any film its point of genesis, and as misguided as I think this risk-averse, franchise-obsessed era of Hollywood is, it's yielded more than a few gems. However, if the goal is for the brand to be more than just a jumping-off point, it needs to really mean something to culture at large.

Barbie and The Lego Movie are both "adaptations" of toy properties that were, creatively, huge successes. That both were made well by filmmakers with strong points of view was a big part of that. But they also tapped into what their respective toys mean to the world, and found some interesting, insightful, and sometimes moving things to say about them. Most things aren't big enough to mean that much, no matter what their ad copy says. The opening of Matchbox makes the fatal mistake of behaving as if it does. It strikes such a false note, and strikes it with such force, that it's very tough to shake.

Most Of Matchbox: The Movie Is A Shaky But Fun Action Comedy

The rest of the movie does its best to help us along, though. The script is uneven at times, and as the supposed emotional anchors of the story, Sean and Aimee could've used more robust characterization than they get. For the most part, however, Matchbox delivers on the globetrotting, high-octane silliness of its setup. Cena is a strong choice to lead the ensemble, as both a capable action star and a talented comedic presence, though he's asked most often to lean on the first skillset. Hargrave, a former stunt coordinator, gives him plenty of solid stuntwork that's both expressive and entertaining to watch in itself. The vehicle work, obviously crucial here, is engaging stuff.

The more Matchbox leans into them, the more the movie is entertaining in just the way I'd hoped it would be.

The true MVPs are the supporting trio that make good on the normal-people-in-a-spy-movie concept. Sam Richardson and Teyonah Parris find a good dynamic as the fearful husband and competent wife, with the former gradually realizing the extent to which he's held his partner back from the adventures she's been craving. Arturo Castro plays Ted with just the right amount of over-confidence to make it funny whenever he decides to contribute. Until they all find their footing across an extended, well-done chase scene to kick off the final act, the three of them are usually either unwillingly thrust right in the midst of danger, or involving themselves to disastrous consequences. The more Matchbox leans into them, the more the movie is entertaining in just the way I'd hoped it would be.

I should be able to talk about this film with more appreciation for what it accomplishes, limited by its script though it is. Instead, I'm more inclined to wonder, with a tinge of sadness, whether this is really what it takes to get a good idea for an action-comedy made these days – and whether the trade-off in immersion is worth the extra production value. Overall, I'm not sure I have my answer yet. But it wasn't this time.

Matchbox: The Movie is available to stream on Apple TV from Friday, October 9.