Since his very funny and sweet performance in Guardians of the Galaxy, Dave Bautista has rightfully been praised for what a terrific actor he’s turned out to be. And yes, the thoughtfulness and calmness he can so deftly convey obviously stand out even more because they’re a seeming contradiction to our assumptions, which are based on him being a big, buff, heavily tattooed guy who looks like the pro wrestler he actually was for many years. But Bautista’s skills go beyond “I didn’t expect a dude who looks like that to sound like that,” as he’s a genuinely empathetic and skilled performer.
All of which is to say… can we please get Bautista some better movies to headline? While he’s shined in supporting roles in big-budget films like Blade Runner 2049, and was very well-used by M. Night Shyamalan in Knock at the Cabin, many of the films Bautista is top billed in have felt beneath his talent. And unfortunately, that’s the case for the very clunky and strained Trap House. Bautista is dependably solid in the film, but it’s in service of a role and storyline that never feels worth investing in.
Bautista stars as Ray Seale, one of a group of DEA agents living in El Paso, Texas. The film’s setup is that Ray’s son, and many of his squad’s teenage kids, are all buddies at the local high school, where they must help protect the truth about their parents’ actual careers, lest the deadly drug cartels discover who they are. But when one of Ray’s squad members is killed, it’s Ray’s kid, Cody (Jack Champion), who guides his buddies to turn Robin Hood by robbing the local cartel to get much-needed money for their friend Jesse (Blu del Barrio), whose father was the agent who died. To sell this, Trap House posits that these kids are very easily able to access their parents’ DEA weapons and equipment, along with the information on the people their parents are tracking, all of which suggests these agents are terrible at their jobs and incredibly reckless.
This is a bigger-than-life scenario that the film plays deadly serious from the get-go. There’s a lot of tonal disparity here, because, on one hand, this feels like the kind of concept that could (and probably should) be played as heightened and slick at the start – even as, regardless of the initial tone, you know something inevitably has to go wrong for these kids as they tempt fate too many times. But director Michael Dowse (who also directed Bautista in Stuber) clearly wants this to feel real from start to finish, making sure that we quickly see people shot in bloody and violent ways to help raise the stakes. And yet the film can’t ever feel all that real, because little of its central conceit actually feels plausible. It turns into a vicious cycle: Trap House is too silly to take seriously, but then plays things too seriously to have much fun with. Rather than at least turning into something amusingly campy, it mostly feels rather dull.
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It also oddly feels like we’re being dropped into a later installment of an already-established film or TV series, in which the now older kids are finally given their own big storyline. The early scenes feel rushed, not letting us spend enough time with Ray and Cody in their normal life before Cody embarks on his oh-so-dangerous plan. Just about all the relationships are given a shorthand, including Ray delivering an emotional speech at his friend’s funeral that includes the oh-so cliché line “He was the best of us,” while describing a character the audience had zero investment in before his death. If you say so, Ray!
The script is by Gary Scott Thompson and Tom O’Connor, with Thompson standing out as one of the writers of the first two Fast & Furious films. And look, if Trap House could achieve the sort of goofy, earnest charm of those Fast movies, it might work, but it’s trying too hard to be grounded without actually accomplishing that. It’s also never genuinely edgy and includes an attempt at a plot twist that couldn’t be more telegraphed or easy to predict – though it did at least lead to a solid laugh when one character, now that their true nature is revealed, shows up in a very different outfit than they were in previously in order to emphasize the shift.
Starting with Bautista, the movie does boast an impressive cast, even if the majority of them feel mostly wasted, including Bobby Cannavale, playing Ray’s fellow DEA agent and best friend. Better Call Saul’s ever-charismatic Tony Dalton and The Cleaning Lady’s Kate del Castillo play the brother-and-sister duo who head the film’s evil drug cartel, and are at least given a dynamic that feels a bit different in this type of story, even if more could be done with their characters. Cody’s friends-turned-robbers group are also made up of a likable ensemble of actors, including Whitney Peak, Zaire Adams and Sophia Lillis – though seeing Lillis mostly had me wishing she was instead starring in a sequel to the great Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves.
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Unfortunately, Jack Champion, who was quite good in both Avatar: The Way of Water and Scream VI, comes off as overly callow here as Cody. He is essentially our co-lead, given we jump back and forth between Ray and his son throughout the story, but it’s hard to care much about Cody given how hollow he feels as a character.
Trap House leaves off with a bit of sequel bait that feels like quite a reach, given that it’s hard to expect a potential audience will have much enthusiasm for another story with these characters. As much as I bemoan Dave Bautista not often starring in better films, it is worth noting he is a producer on this movie as well, so he was heavily involved in making this project happen behind the scenes. And look, even after proving his talent across several films, it’s likely still tricky for him to find great starring vehicles, given his appearance is so specific and Hollywood often loves to put people in boxes. But hopefully that can change for him going forward, because Dave, seriously, you’re so much better than Trap House deserves!
Release Date
November 14, 2025
Director
Michael Dowse
Writers
Gary Scott Thompson
Producers
Michael A. Pruss, Marc Goldberg, Sarah Gabriel, Dave Bautista, Rebecca Feuer, Todd Lundbohm
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