Movies that spend an inordinately long time sitting on the shelf often release for the sole purpose of everybody discovering there were many entirely valid reasons for allowing it to gather dust on the shelf for so long, but the exact opposite turned out to be true of the delightfully deranged Boss Level.
Production on the sci-fi shoot ’em up with a time loop twist wrapped in early 2018, but it wouldn’t be until March of 2021 that audiences got to experience the madness for themselves. When they did, it proved to be worth the wait and then some, with director Joe Carnahan and star/producer Frank Grillo conspiring to deliver one of the most underrated actioners in recent memory.
Calling it Groundhog Day meets Die Hard meets is somewhat reductive but also largely accurate, with Grillo’s hero reliving the same day over and over again to learn from his mistakes, annihilate his enemies, and finally make it all the way to the top of the food chain for a final showdown with Mel Gibson’s villain.
Having been shuffled around the streaming circuit with reckless abandon after premiering as a Hulu original prior to being designated as a Prime Video exclusive in other markets, Boss Level has now achieved a three-peat by debuting as one of the biggest hits on Netflix.
Per FlixPatrol, the gratuitously violent and deliriously over-the-top high concept caper has arrived as the eighth top-viewed feature on the global charts, opening up a whole new audience to what’s almost the living embodiment of an underrated, undervalued, and unheralded gem.
