'THE RIP'........DRUG COPS BEN 'N MATT BLAST AWAY AT WHO KNOWS WHAT AND WHO KNOWS WHO.....

 The Rip (Netflix-2026)

              Let's credit writer-director Joe Carnahan ("Narc") with coming up with another tough-as-nails cop thriller that plays out more than worthy of a theatrical release before it premiered on Netflix.

        (We'd gladly have enjoyed this film on the big screen rather than some of the sludge parked in the Multiplexes now, like 'Greenland 2' (really?) and the killer-chimp jump-scare junker.....)

         And let's welcome back everybody's favorite actor-writer-director-producer amigos Ben Affleck and Matt Damon, who turn up their charismatic motormouthed energy and chemistry way past '11' on the Spinal Tap dial. 

        We're deep in Michael Mann territory here, amid the shaky shifting morality of films like "Thief" and "Heat". In Miami, Detective Dane Dumar (Damon) has found himself promoted as leader of his take-no-prisoners Narcotics task force along with his good buddy/second-in-command JD Byrne (Affleck). 

          That's after their captain's been murdered by two masked gunmen and their team's under heavy scrutiny by Internal Affairs and JD's brother Del (Scott Adkins), an FBI agent. It seems nobody fully trusts drug cops to give a truthful account of the vast amounts of cash ('the rip') they scoop up from up raids on Cartel drug houses. 

           Based on an anonymous phone tip to Dane, the team's off the to a strangely deserted cul-de-sac street in suburban Hilaleah to snare potentially hundreds of thousands of dollars in Cartel money. 

           Hundreds of thousands?  How about over 20 million......which sends Dane into a paranoid frenzy, making JD thinking he's turned rogue and plans to steal it. And just as suspicions and tempers grow white hot, the team's under siege from automatic weapons fire coming from the suddenly not so quiet neighborhood. 

           As bullets fly furiously, the film starts to toss in multiple twists as to who's doing the shooting, who's left who can be trusted, who's dirty, who's clean and what in the holy hell is going on here anyway? Those twists and questions never end even as the action and carnage escalate into perpetual firefights and spectacular chases.

         For everyone who loves stuff like this, 'The Rip' will fairly rip you every which way with its mixture of constant plot surprises and blistering gunfire.  Affleck, Damon and their team (Teyana Taylor, Steven Yeun, Catalina Sandino Moreno) all turn up the dramatic heat on each other as they're under fire and their loyalties questioned. 

           BQ had a gun blazin' good time with this one, so we'd say....check it out.  For this type of movie, it's a 5 star bonfire to warm up your cold winter nights. (*****).  (and not a killer monkey in sight.....)