''Tracers'' is a 2015 American

action film Action film is a film genre in which the protagonist is thrust into a series of events that typically involve violence and physical feats. The genre tends to feature a mostly resourceful hero struggling against incredible odds, which include life ...

directed by Daniel Benmayor with a screenplay by Matt Johnson and a story by Johnson, T.J. Scott, and Kevin Lund. The film stars

Taylor Lautner Taylor Daniel Lautner (; born February 11, 1992) is an American actor. He is best known for playing Therianthropy, shapeshifter Jacob Black in ''The Twilight Saga (film series), The Twilight Saga'' film series. Lautner began his acting caree ...

Marie Avgeropoulos Marie Avgeropoulos (Greek language, Greek: Μαρία "Μαρί" Αυγεροπούλου, born 17 June 1986) is a Canadian actress and model. She is best known for her role as Octavia Blake on The CW's post-apocalyptic science fiction, post-ap ...

Adam Rayner Adam Chance Abbs Rayner (born 28 August 1977) is an English actor. He is known for television roles including: Dominic Montgomery in ''Mistresses'', Dr. Steve Shaw in ''Hawthorne'', Aidan Marsh in '' Hunted'', Bassam "Barry" Al-Fayeed in ''Tyran ...

, and

Rafi Gavron Raphael Pichey Gavron (born 24 June 1989) is an English-American actor. He had supporting roles in the films ''Breaking and Entering'' (2006), '' Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist'' (2008), '' A Star Is Born'' (2018), and the series ''Life Unex ...

. The film was released on March 20, 2015.

Plot

Cam is a NYC bike messenger struggling to make ends meet. He rents a garage from a woman, Angie. While on a run, Cam wrecks his bike after a stranger named Nikki causes an accident while escaping police officers. Cam is later accosted by Jerry and Hu, enforcers who take his check and cash, warning him that he is behind on payments for a $15,000 loan to the Tong, a local gang that controls Chinatown, and warn him not to miss another payment. Cam spends his free time trying to fix his father's 1967 Pontiac GTO. Cam's boss calls, telling him that his "girlfriend" has dropped off his new bike. Cam finds Nikki to thank her and tries to copy Nikki's

parkour Parkour () is an athletic training discipline or sport in which practitioners (called ''traceurs'') attempt to get from point A to point B in the fastest and most efficient way possible, without assisting equipment and often while performing a ...

, but fails. He also meets the rest of Nikki's group, who warn him about the dangers of parkour. Cam begins practicing parkour. Eventually, Cam catches the attention of the group, and is invited to train with them. He is formally introduced to the rest of the squad: Jax, Tate, Nikki's older brother Dylan, and Miller, the group's leader. After a workout, Cam arrives home to find Jerry and Hu taking his father's car, taking off $5,000 dollars off his debt for it. They warn him he has one month to pay the rest of the $10,000, threatening Angie and her son. Angered, Angie packs Cam's belongings and kicks him out. Cam joins the group for work. Miller tells Cam that he must follow two rules: if Cam gets into trouble, he must call him immediately and he must stay out of Chinatown. Cam quickly becomes a valuable member of the team. He visits Angie at work and explains that he took the loan from the Tongs to help his sick mother keep her house, but that the money wasn't enough to stop

foreclosure Foreclosure is a legal process in which a lender attempts to recover the balance of a loan from a borrower who has stopped making payments to the lender by forcing the sale of the asset used as the collateral for the loan. Formally, a mortg ...

and his mother died a week after. Cam runs into Jerry and Hu, who beat him for not having the money and give him two weeks to pay off his debt or they will kill Angie and Joey. Cam makes a move on Nikki at a party. Nikki initially reciprocates, but then runs out of the party. Miller arrives to pick her up as she is Miller's partner. Nikki apologizes to Cam for not being honest. Cam invites Nikki to leave the city with him once he clears his debt, but Nikki is hesitant. For their biggest heist yet, the group tries to rob a bank run by Vietnamese gangsters. They discover that the money had been moved earlier, and flee as reinforcements arrive. Jax is shot and killed, and Cam is arrested. Miller visits Cam while the police question him. Miller reveals himself to be James Hatcher, a corrupt

DEA The Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA; ) is a United States federal law enforcement agency under the U.S. Department of Justice tasked with combating drug trafficking and distribution within the U.S. It is the lead agency for domestic enf ...

agent. Miller tells Cam he can free him by claiming him as a

confidential informant An informant (also called an informer or, as a slang term, a “snitch”) is a person who provides privileged information about a person or organization to an agency. The term is usually used within the law-enforcement world, where informan ...

for the DEA; in return, Cam must help him pull off one last heist. Cam reluctantly agrees. Cam confronts Nikki for not telling him Miller's true identity. Nikki apologizes and reveals she is indebted to Miller for helping Dylan escape custody for beating a man who had sexually assaulted her. On the day of the heist, Miller, Cam, and Dylan go to a

Russian Russian(s) refers to anything related to Russia, including: *Russians (, ''russkiye''), an ethnic group of the East Slavic peoples, primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries *Rossiyane (), Russian language term for all citizens and peo ...

safehouse A safe house (also spelled safehouse) is, in a generic sense, a secret place for sanctuary or suitable to hide people from the law, hostile actors or actions, or from retribution, threats or perceived danger. It may also be a metaphor. Histori ...

to steal a stash of diamonds. Nikki realizes Cam is being set up and goes to save him. Miller steals the diamonds and almost kills Cam, but is stopped as guards arrive and attack them. Cam takes the diamonds and flees, and Miller chases. Reuniting with Nikki, Cam leads Miller into a restaurant owned by Chen, leader of the Tongs. Chen reminds Miller that he has violated his agreement to never enter Chinatown and has him board a ship headed for

Macau Macau or Macao (; ; ; ), officially the Macao Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China (MSAR), is a city and special administrative region of China in the western Pearl River Delta by the South China Sea. With a pop ...

, never to return. Cam hands the diamonds to Chen, clearing his debt. Jerry congratulates Cam for clearing his debt and returns his father's car, now fully restored. Cam and Nikki drive off.

Cast

as Cam *

as Nikki *

as Miller *

as Dylan * Christopher Jackson as Lonnie * Luciano Acuna Jr. as Tate * Josh Yadon as Jax * Johnny M. Wu as Jerry * Sam Medina as Hu *

Amirah Vann Amirah Charline Vann (born 1980) is an American actress and singer. She is best known for playing attorney Tegan Price in ''How to Get Away with Murder''. Life and career Amirah Charline Vann was born in 1980, in Queens, New York. Her father is ...

as Angie * Christian Steel as Joey * Wai Ching Ho as Chen

Production

The shooting of the film began on June 18, 2013, and wrapped on August 1, 2013, with filming locations including

Central Park Central Park is an urban park in New York City located between the Upper West Side, Upper West and Upper East Sides of Manhattan. It is the List of New York City parks, fifth-largest park in the city, covering . It is the most visited urban par ...

, Riverside Park, and

Long Island City Long Island City (LIC) is a residential and commercial neighborhood on the extreme western tip of Queens, a borough in New York City. It is bordered by Astoria to the north; the East River to the west; New Calvary Cemetery in Sunnyside to the ...

. Shooting also took place in

Hackensack, New Jersey Hackensack is a city in and the county seat of Bergen County, New Jersey, United States.New Jers ...

Reception

Critical response

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang ...

, the film has an approval rating of 23%, based on 30 reviews, with an average rating of 4.40/10. On

Metacritic Metacritic is a website that review aggregator, aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted arithmetic mean, weighted average). M ...

, the film has a

weighted average The weighted arithmetic mean is similar to an ordinary arithmetic mean (the most common type of average), except that instead of each of the data points contributing equally to the final average, some data points contribute more than others. The ...

score of 45 out of 100, based on reviews from 13 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews". Called "fun to watch" for the action sequences and energetic use of young actors trained in parkour, the plot was generally regarded as a "

B-Movie A B movie or B film is a low-budget commercial motion picture. In its original usage, during the Golden Age of Hollywood, the term more precisely identified films intended for distribution as the less-publicized bottom half of a double featur ...

Accolades

References

External links

* * * * {{AllMovie title, 565193 2015 films 2015 action thriller films 2015 crime thriller films American action thriller films American crime thriller films Films set in New York City Parkour in film Temple Hill Entertainment films Films shot in New York City Films shot in New Jersey Saban Films films Films scored by Lucas Vidal Films produced by Wyck Godfrey 2010s English-language films 2010s American films