Imagine James Bond was two guys. Both spies, both deadly and efficient, one would be the smooth ladykiller – let’s get Chris Pine to play him – and the other would be a little more brutal in a fight but also a little bit more of a softie at heart – Tom Hardy sounds good there. Now imagine you were Lauren (Reese Witherspoon), the woman that these two super-spies were fighting over, using all the high-tech gadgets and manpower at their disposal to win your love. Wouldn’t you feel special? Like, Osama Bin Laden special?

Of course you would. For one thing, FDR (Pine) lives in an apartment under a glass-bottomed swimming pool so when he looks up after a hard days spying he can watch a bikini-clad hottie swim by and yet he still wants you. For another, Tuck (Hardy) has just come out of a marriage destroyed by his inability to tell his gorgeous wife and adorable son what he does for a living and yet he still wants you. As for you… well, you make a living running focus groups safety-testing household products and have Chelsea Handler as your best friend. Lucky you’ve got two spies chasing after your love, right?

This being a Hollywood rom-com, there can be no suggestion that a single woman might set out to play the field. So while Lauren and Tuck meet via internet dating, FDR appears in her life at a video store where they meet over a copy of the American remake of The Vanishing. What, the store was out of Blair Witch 2: Book of Shadows? While Tuck is on the proper relationship track, FDR is the arrogant guy she only dates on a dare. And, as these rom-coms go, neither guy knows the other is making a move until they’ve both fallen for her. That’s when the wacky comedy begins in earnest, just in case lines like “men are really going to respond to that camel toe” haven’t already split your sides.

If you’ve ever wondered how the CIA could have dropped the ball as far as 9/11 goes, the answer’s right here: their spies were too busy spending billions of dollars trying to cock-block each other. Bugs are planted, drones are deployed, surveillance teams are put in place and both guys bring their A-game to the task of winning the lady over. One guy has art history fed to him through an earpiece to seem learned; another goes berserk on a paintball range when intel suggests she thinks he’s a little soft. Obviously it’s not going to be an easy choice for Lauren, but fortunately she has a plan that’ll sort the men from the boys: “sex tie-breaker”. Yes, she actually says those words.

Mixing spy action with romantic comedy should be a win/win situation: spies are kind of sexy, glamour is always romantic, and danger can often be an aphrodisiac. But This Means War joins the long list of spy romances (from the forgettable Mr & Mrs Smith to Katherine Heigl’s really forgettable The Killers) where these two great tastes end up tasting like one big mess.

Director McG is best known for flashy action films (he directed the Charlie’s Angels movies, plus the dud Terminator: Salvation) but the action here is choppy and fairly dull, which is hardly surprising as the action subplot (our heroes kill off a bad guy’s brother in the first scene and he’s out for revenge) feels like an afterthought. Then again, pretty much everything here feels like an afterthought: this is a film so convinced of your stupidity that when someone says “let’s go for sushi” the place they go to has a giant neon sign that says SUSHI. It could be worse: when they go for pizza, the pizza joint has two PIZZA signs up. And what better way to remind dim-witted viewers that one spy is trying to “sabotage” the other’s plans than by playing the Beastie Boys’ “Sabotage”? Don’t bother writing in, Hollywood doesn’t want to know.

Fortunately the cast manage to occasionally crack open the script’s cast-iron dullness and let brief flashes of personality shine out. Witherspoon is charming and likable enough to make it at least semi-likely that two international men of mystery would fall for her, while Pine and Hardy’s on-screen friendship is plausible enough to give their falling out some dramatic heft. As for Handler as the traditional smutty friend, she’s shrill and crass enough that the film’s surprisingly nasty digs at her get laughs.

But the line that sums this film up best isn’t during the final car chase when someone shouts “that freeway’s incomplete!” Or when juvenile spy innuendos are employed,“he entered the premises”. No, it’s at the end when Lauren foolishly opens her mouth to talk and FDR tells her “No more thinking”. 

Presumably, that’s what McG said at the start of production.

Two stars