OUTSIDE THE WIRE

(Mikael Håfström, 2021, USA)

War has gone robotic in the latest Netflix original film, set only 15 years from now yet somehow featuring fully automated mechanical soldiers (nicknamed Gumps, for some reason that is never made clear) and an experimental android cosplaying as a military officer (and played by Anthony Mackie) involved in a terrifyingly plausible Ukrainian civil war. Drone pilot Harp (Damson Idris) is sent to this futuristic conflict, as punishment for a friendly-fire incident that killed two American soldiers; reassigned to Mackie’s Captain Leo, Harp experiences on-the-ground combat for the first time in an ostensible mission to deliver vaccines to a refugee camp beyond enemy lines (hence the film’s unimaginative title). Of course, there’s a little more to it than that, but the plot seems little more than an excuse to showcase Mackie’s super-soldier performing superhuman stunts, with only a few heady sci-fi notions thrown in, as a treat.