Mayday (2026) – Review by Andrea Carnevali

Kenneth Branagh as Nikolai Ustinov and Ryan Reynolds as Troy Kelly

Mayday

⭐⭐⭐ 1/2

A derivitive, but surprisingly funny thriller that’s perfect for when you want to switch your brain off

I always approach Ryan Reynolds films with a certain amount of caution. He may be a funny guy in real life, but let’s face it, he’s essentially been playing variations of himself for years now, and that type of wisecracking, slightly obnoxious persona can sometimes wear a little thin.

Take Deadpool out of the equation and, at least in my book, his films have generally been more miss than hit. So I wasn’t expecting much from Mayday. But with this being pretty much the only new film out at the moment, I decided to give it a try.

Which should give you some idea of my surprise when, halfway through, I suddenly realised not only I was completely hooked but I was laughing with the film like I never thought I would.

The basic set-up feels like a pastiche of your average ’80s action movie, the kind of story we’ve seen a thousand times before, rehashed here through possibly some generic algorithm: an American pilot is selected for a secret mission in Russia, his plane gets shot down and he finds himself stranded behind enemy lines. To survive, he’s forced to rely on the help of an old KGB agent, played with superb deadpan flair by Kenneth Branagh.

There’s very little in Mayday that you could call original, and the plot certainly has its fair share of predictabilities and contrivances, but the film manages to overcome most of them by playing to its real strengths: the chemistry between its two leads, a brisk pace and some highly kinetic action sequences, complete with a few brilliantly inventive camera moves (most of which will pass by the average viewer, but I have to confess I got a kick out of them).

And then, of course, there’s the 80s nostalgia. Like so many films and TV series these days, Mayday positively bathes in the 1980s. Top Gun isn’t just an obvious frame of reference; it gets quoted, discussed and invoked so many times that by the end you’ll probably want to go home and watch it all over again.

There are plenty of funny digs at American pop culture too, from Bruce Springsteen to McDonald’s, but underneath all the jokes there’s also a slightly more interesting idea at play: the great American Dream of the 1980s being looked back on from a more disillusioned present. The optimism, consumerism and flag-waving mythology of that era inevitably look a little different when viewed from an America in which Donald Trump is once again president.

The film never pushes any of this particularly hard (nor should it), but there’s just enough there to give that nostalgia a slightly sharper edge.Ultimately, though, Mayday really only wants to entertain you. And, to be honest, it does exactly that. Full stop. No point in complaining.

There’s a sequence somewhere around the middle of the film in which Reynolds and Branagh have to hide together inside a cupboard, and it is genuinely one of the funniest things I’ve seen all year. Much of that is down to the wonderful contrast between Reynolds’s energy and Branagh’s gloriously straight-faced delivery.

So if you’re looking for something undemanding but well-made, with plenty of action, laughs and ’80s nostalgia, something that lets you happily switch your brain off for a couple of hours, Mayday is pretty much the perfect film for the job.

Andrea Carnevali is a Bafta winning film maker who lives in Chiswick, and a co-creator of the Chiswick In Film festival.