Cleaner (2025) Quiver Distribution/Action-Thriller RT: 98 minutes Rated R (violence, language throughout, brief drug use) Director: Martin Campbell Screenplay: Simon Uttley, Paul Andrew Williams and Matthew Orton Music: Tom Hodge Cinematography: Eigil Bryld Release date: February 21, 2025 (US) Cast: Daisy Ridley, Clive Owen, Taz Skylar, Matthew Tuck, Ruth Gemmell, Rufus Jones, Lee Boardman, Stella Stocker, Flavia Watson, Ray Fearon, Howard Charles, Tom Boney, Sol E. Romero, Russell De Rozario. Box Office: $1.2M (US)
Rating: ***
To fully enjoy the British-made Die Hard knock-off Cleaner, you have to accept the silly and derivative premise without question. If you try to bring logic into it, you’re just going to ruin it. It’s best just to sit back, turn your brain off and enjoy the ride.
Cleaner benefits greatly from a director who knows his way around an action picture. Martin Campbell’s resume includes two James Bond outings, GoldenEye (1995) and Casino Royale (2006), The Mask of Zorro (1998) and its sequel The Legend of Zorro (2005), the underrated Jackie Chan revenge thriller The Foreigner (2017) and the Liam Neeson vehicle Memory (2022). He’s very good at what he does. He continues this streak with Cleaner which stars Daisy Ridley (Rey from the Star Wars sequels) as a window cleaner who takes on terrorists attempting a hostile takeover at a high-rise building.
Ridley plays Joey Locke, a highly trained ex-soldier having a bad day. Her autistic older brother Michael (Tuck) has just been kicked out of his ninth care facility. She literally has no one to leave him with so she has to take him to work with her. She’s late which means she’s going to catch s*** the whole day from her dick of a boss. She works as a window cleaner at a tall building in the heart of London, a job that requires her to be suspended high above the ground at dizzying heights. It’s a good thing she’s not acrophobic.
She’s just about to end her shift when eco-terrorists show up at a gala being held by the billion-dollar energy company that owns the building. They take over the building leaving Joey hanging around outside. They take everybody hostage- executives, guests, staff and residents- with the intention of forcing the company to publicly admit their ecological misdeeds. Michael is not among the hostages. He was wandering around the building when it all went down. Still, it’s only a matter of time before he’s found. Joey has to figure out a way to get inside and rescue him. While she’s at it, she may as well try to take down the terrorists and save everyone else too.
SPOILER ALERT! Clive Owen (Children of Men) plays Marcus, the leader of the activist group behind the takeover. At least he is until he has an ideological disagreement with a less stable member of the group, Joey’s co-worker Noah (Skylar, One Piece) who wants to achieve the same end by less civilized means. In other words, he’s a violent psycho. As for Marcus, why don’t I just say he makes an early exit and leave it at that?
And where are the police while all this is going on? Why, they’re outside trying to gain control of the situation, where else? It’s an exercise in futility, of course. Noah has them over a barrel. That’s what he thinks anyway. He knows that Joey is hanging from a rope outside the building, but doesn’t believe she’ll be able to breach. The police official in charge, Director Claire Hills (Gemmell, Bridgerton), thinks otherwise. She’s counting on Joey to help save the day with her specialized military training and can-do spirit.
I honestly wish they’d make more movies like Cleaner. It’s the kind of medium-budgeted action flick that used to play in multiplexes in the 90s. I remember spending many a Friday or Saturday night watching such movies with friends at the local AMC. It doesn’t rely on spectacle or $150M worth of crappy CGI effects. It earns its thrills through stunt work and fight sequences that aren’t edited beyond comprehension. It’s as old school as an action movie can get without the makers going back in time and filming it retroactively.
Ridley keeps proving herself a more than capable leading lady. She endows Joey with strength and brazenness that shows up before the terrorists do. Standing with a pregnant friend and co-worker, she comments about the lack of benefits available to expectant employees within earshot of the two big bosses. She’s got balls! Owen isn’t around long enough to say much of anything about his performance. He’s good with what little he’s given to do. Skylar makes a good crazed baddie, but he’s nowhere near as terrifying as Hans Gruber. NOBODY is.
Cleaner is hardly what I’d call a refined action movie, but it still has plenty to offer what with Campbell’s assured direction and Ridley’s committed performance. It’s fairly predictable and routine. There are no surprises or unexpected plot twists except maybe for Clive’s early exit. It’s still a fun action flick that makes for ideal viewing on a Friday or Saturday night.
