2 guns movie review

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2 Guns Reviews

Don’t be fooled by the title: there are hundreds of guns and bazillions of spent rounds in this fast-moving action flick.

Full Review | Feb 21, 2023

2 Guns is conventional, and the sense of humor is somewhat caustic, but ultimately the mild chuckles and fast-paced exploits of Beans and Stig provide a lazy diversion the viewer will instantly forget once the credits start to roll.

Full Review | Original Score: 2.5/4 | Aug 30, 2022

Despite not owning an ounce of originality, 2 Guns more than makes up for it through the chemistry of Washington and Wahlberg.

Full Review | Original Score: B | Sep 17, 2021

In lesser hands, this clash of severe situations and insolence in the face of death might fail, but both Denzel Washington and Mark Wahlberg are convincing.

Full Review | Original Score: 7/10 | Dec 3, 2020

The film will at least give you a solid two hours of escapist fun before sending you back out into the real world.

Full Review | Original Score: 2.5/4.0 | Sep 24, 2020

The screenplay convolutes different characters and plot threads into a mess ... By the time we get to the big showdown, I found myself thinking, 'How did we get here again?'

Full Review | Original Score: C+ | Jul 24, 2020

"2 Guns" doesn't delve into any unexplored territory, but it delivers precisely what the it promises, shootouts and wise cracks.

Full Review | Original Score: B | Jul 8, 2020

It takes two actors you would never think to put together ... reworks and restructures [the genre's conventions] and puts the puzzle pieces together to make a picture that is completely different than the one on the box.

Full Review | Jun 29, 2020

Cinema "Kleenex" in its most entertaining version, but cinema to use and throw away after all. [Full Review in Spanish]

Full Review | Apr 18, 2020

It's a slick piece of escapism that gets by largely on its star power -- not a bad thing when that star power is Denzel Washington and Mark Wahlberg.

Full Review | Apr 9, 2019

A Tex-Mex neo-western that embraces its dusty, southern setting, which stands out commendably amidst all the blood thanks to cinematographer Oliver Wood.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/5 | Mar 2, 2019

It doesn't work at all but it also works completely, you know? Perfect for a dumb August afternoon.

Full Review | Nov 16, 2018

Washington and Wahlberg, however, are charismatic and wildly entertaining (I found myself actually hoping for a sequel.)

Full Review | Original Score: 7/10 | Nov 6, 2018

[2 Guns] is a fun, gritty, action buddy-comedy action thriller and feels like it could have been lifted straight out of the 90's.

Full Review | Original Score: 6.5/10 | Oct 11, 2018

It's kind of an action movie Cornell Box.

Full Review | Aug 30, 2018

... I can barely remember anything about it except that I'm annoyed that I wasted my time.

Full Review | Oct 21, 2017

... it's not that bad. But it ain't good either.

Full Review | Original Score: D+ | Sep 6, 2017

Movie rule 12: Mistrust anything bearing a '2' in its title - particularly when it's not a sequel. But 2 Guns proves a totally unexpected exception.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/5 | Sep 5, 2017

Pair their back and forth with a hilarious cast of periphery players and 2 Guns pretty much has everything you'd want from a summer action comedy.

Full Review | Original Score: B | Jun 29, 2016

If 'Lethal Weapon' and 'Midnight Run' were billiard balls, Kormkur's directing is the cue ball hitting those two and smacking '2 Guns' straight in the corner pocket. Classic.

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5 | Jun 5, 2016

Cast & crew
User reviews

Mark Wahlberg and Denzel Washington in 2 Guns (2013)

Two hardened criminals get into trouble with the US border patrol after meeting with a Mexican drug lord, and then revelations start to unfold. Two hardened criminals get into trouble with the US border patrol after meeting with a Mexican drug lord, and then revelations start to unfold. Two hardened criminals get into trouble with the US border patrol after meeting with a Mexican drug lord, and then revelations start to unfold.

Baltasar Kormákur
Blake Masters
Steven Grant
Denzel Washington
Mark Wahlberg
Paula Patton
268 User reviews
205 Critic reviews
55 Metascore

Top cast 84

Chief Lucas

Admiral Tuwey

Ferret Nose Julio

Rudy (Papi's Men)

(as Kyle Russell Clements)

(as Matthew Cook)

(as Timothy Bell)

(as Tait G. Fletcher)

Waitress Maggie

Officer Dave
All cast & crew
Production, box office & more at IMDbPro

More like this

Did you know

Trivia In the commentary, the director and producer mention that many of the best lines in the film were improvised by Denzel Washington and Mark Wahlberg .
Goofs Earl tells Papi that he could have Papi's place attacked by "Apache A-6" helicopters. The A-6 is a jet fighter; the Apache helicopter is designated AH-64.

Bobby : You never heard the saying, never rob a bank across from a diner with the best donuts in three counties?

Connections Featured in ReelzChannel Specials: Richard Roeper's Red Hot Summer (2013)
Soundtracks All the Blues I Need Written by Jai Josefs Performed by Erica Alexander Courtesy of FirstCom Music

User reviews 268

Jul 24, 2013
When exactly are the scenes of nudity, and what're the timestamps for when the scenes occur?
What is '2 Guns' about?
Is '2 Guns' based on a comic book?
August 2, 2013 (United States)
United States
Official Facebook
Universal (United States)
Armados y peligrosos
Rio Rancho, New Mexico, USA
Universal Pictures
Emmett/Furla Oasis Films
Marc Platt Productions
See more company credits at IMDbPro
$61,000,000 (estimated)
$75,612,460
$27,059,130
Aug 4, 2013
$131,940,411

Technical specs

Runtime 1 hour 49 minutes
Dolby Digital

More to explore

Film Review: ‘2 Guns’

Denzel Washington and Mark Wahlberg make for an enjoyable pair in this fleet, unpretentious caper pic from Baltasar Kormakur.

By Scott Foundas

Scott Foundas

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Denzel Washington and Mark Wahlberg make for a very enjoyable pair of double-crossed undercover operatives in “ 2 Guns ,” another fleet, unpretentious caper pic from Icelandic auteur Baltasar Kormakur , who previously teamed with Wahlberg on 2012’s sleeper hit “ Contraband .” Here as there, Kormakur shows he knows his way around an action movie better than most, keeping the pace quick, the banter lively and the old-school, mostly CGI-free thrills delivering right on schedule. Independently financed (by Emmett/Furla Films and Mark Damon ’s Foresight Intl.), the $84 million pic could be just what the doctor ordered to cure domestic distrib Universal’s post-“R.I.P.D.” box office blues, with offshore prospects equally solid.

Based on the 2008 BOOM! Studios comics series by writer Steven Grant and illustrator Mateus Santolouco, the hyper-convoluted plot of “2 Guns ” bears more than a passing resemblance to Oliver Stone’s recent “Savages,” with its dense web of American military types and government agents battling each other — and the Mexican drug cartels — over a multimillion dollar jackpot. It also pays affectionate homage to Don Siegel’s marvelous 1973 “Charley Varrick,” beginning with a bank robbery in the fictional town of Tres Cruces, N.M. (also the setting of Siegel’s pic), where partners in crime Bobby Trench ( Washington ) and Stig Stigman (Wahlberg) attempt to steal $3 million in cash belonging to Mexican drug lord Papi Greco (a terrific Edward James Olmos ).

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TAKEN, Liam Neeson, 2008. TM and ©copyright Twentieth Century Fox. All Rights reserved./Courtesy Everett Collection

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But there’s more to this bank — and to these robbers — than meets the eye. Unbeknownst to each other, Trench is an undercover DEA agent and Stigman an undercover Navy intelligence officer, each on a mission to bring down Greco’s cartel. The bank heist is supposed to be the coup de grace that will land the cartel boss behind bars. Except, like Varrick before them, Trench and Stigman find more cash in the bank’s coffers — about $40 million more — than they anticipated, and before long they’re on the run from a whole slew of bad guys who have their designs on the loot. Among them: Stigman’s Navy superior (steely James Marsden ), Greco’s henchmen, and an initially unidentified group of government heavies (led by a deliciously oily Bill Paxton ) who employ Russian roulette as their preferred interrogation technique.

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It’s spy-versus-spy for a while, with Stig even shooting Bobby in the shoulder and leaving him for dead in the desert, until the two figure out they’re each other’s best hope for making it out of this mess alive. So they pool their resources and set about playing all other sides against an uncertain middle. This leads to a series of slam-bang setpieces in which the two wronged agents try to recover the now-missing loot, variously gaining and losing the upper hand as they travel back and forth across the U.S.-Mexico border. As in “Savages,” there’s a wry, underlying sense in “2 Guns” of the international drug trade as a giant, Monsanto-like corporation in which everybody — from the DEA to the CIA — is in for a piece of the action.

Kormakur, who cut his teeth on commercial Icelandic films that were released internationally as arthouse attractions (most notably, the adaptation of bestselling crime novel “Jar City”), has taken to the American action-movie form like a fish to water. He seems entirely at ease shooting a pickup truck and a Ford Bronco doggedly chasing each other through desert brush, or Washington and Wahlberg playing a very dangerous cat-and-mouse game with the entirety of a Texas Navy base. At their best, both “Contraband” and “2 Guns” recall the work of Walter Hill in their emphasis on teamwork and their energetic, unfussy action staged with a maximum of spatial clarity. (The superb widescreen cinematography, with rich, noir-like blacks and blazing desert browns and yellows, is by Oliver Wood.) Though he doubtless has his sights set on bigger and more outwardly respectable studio projects, one of these a year from Kormakur would hardly be an unwelcome thing.

Where “Contraband” had a built-in rooting interest because of the peril in which the Wahlberg character’s family members ultimately found themselves, “2 Guns” has lower emotional stakes, despite Kormakur and screenwriter Blake Masters ’ efforts to insert some latent romantic tension between Bobby and his estranged ex (a fellow DEA agent played by Paula Patton ). But a movie like this rises or falls by the chemistry of its leads, and Washington and Wahlberg, two of the most likable leading men in movies today to begin with, are especially likable here. The roles are hardly the most challenging of their respective careers, but they invest them with a lot of personality and charm, from the way Wahlberg delivers an ill-timed quip to Washington’s constant fussing with Bobby’s array of designer hats. Thanks to Masters (a Roger Corman alum who created Showtime’s “Brotherhood series), everyone has smarter-than-usual dialogue to spar with. (Washington’s melancholy lament to Patton, “I really meant to love you,” is a line Bogart might have said to Gloria Grahame in “In a Lonely Place.”)

Airtight editing by veteran Tony Scott collaborator Michael Tronick enhances an ace tech package.

Reviewed at AMC Empire, New York, July 24, 2013. (In Locarno Film Festival—Piazza Grande, opener.) MPAA Rating: R. Running time: 108 MIN.

Production: A Universal Pictures release (in U.S.) presented with Emmett/Furla Films of a Marc Platt production in association with Oasis Ventures Entertainment Ltd/Envision Entertainment/Herrick Entertainment/BOOM! Studios. Produced by Marc Platt, Randall Emmett, Norton Herrick, Adam Siegel, George Furla, Ross Richie, Andrew Cosby. Executive producers, Brandt Andersen, Jeffrey Stott, Motaz M. Nabulsi, Joshua Skurla, Mark Damon.
Crew: Directed by Baltasar Kormakur. Screenplay, Blake Masters, based on the BOOM! Studios graphic novels. Camera (Deluxe color, widescreen), Oliver Wood; editor, Michael Tronick; music, Clinton Shorter; music supervisor, Scott Vener; production designer, Beth Mickle; art director, Kevin Hardison; set decorator, Leonard Spears; costume designer, Laura Jean Shannon; sound (DTS/Dolby Digital/SDDS), Willie Burton; re-recording mixers, Joe Barnett, Tony Lamberti; visual effects, Framestore, Ollin VFX, Simple Tricks & Nonsense VFX; second unit director/stunt coordinator, Darrin Prescott; second unit camera, Duane Manwiller, Peter Menzies Jr.; assistant director, John Wildermuth; casting, Sheila Jaffe.
With: Denzel Washington, Mark Wahlberg, Paula Patton, Bill Paxton, James Marsden, Fred Ward, Edward James Olmos.