As the strong and stunning leading lady of Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol, Paula Patton showed audiences worldwide that she could kick some major ass—even out of a building if need be. She was sleek and believable as a secret agent, and proved a good match opposite such serious star power as Tom Cruise and Jeremy Renner. So it's little wonder that's she has been offered a role in Universal's heist thriller 2 Guns opposite Denzel Washington. He and Mark Wahlberg will front the film that Deadline reports will be helmed by Contraband director Baltasar Kormakur.
Inspired by Steven Grant's plot-twisting comic book of the same name, 2 Guns centers on two undercover cops, one a DEA agent and the other a Naval Intelligence officer, who aim to rob a bank they believe is a front for the local mob. However, neither knows the other is actually a cop, and after they pull off the robbery they discover they haven't robbed the mob, but the CIA. It's a winding and wild crime narrative in the vein of Ocean's Eleven, but with Washington and Wahlberg at its core. Neither is well known for the sense of whimsy that the Ocean's franchise's possessed, but both have a strange star power that could prove explosive when combined.
For her part Patton will fill the role of Washington's love interest, which she's played before in a flick I barely remember, Déjà vu. While I'm eager to see more of Patton, it seems a shame to waste her in what is likely a thankless girlfriend role, a common trap that many beautiful actresses often fall into but few make their way out of. Still, maybe the script from screenwriter Blake Masters (Law & Order: LA, Brotherhood) will offer Patton something more complex and unexpected than a love interest role typically provides. If not, Patton will have another chance to show her dramatic chops in the recently wrapped feature Disconnect, in which she co-stars with Alexander Skarsgård and Jason Bateman. That drama is expected to hit later this year.
