The chemistry between Chris Evans and Ana de Armas must have been lost in post

There’s a lesson Hollywood can learn from Apple TV+’s action-romance comedy Ghostly: If you want to tell a story about a jerk who falls in love with a spy, don’t cast Captain America as the ordinary one. That’s asking too much of your audience. You can’t give us Chris Evans as a guy named Cole Riggan (surely spit out by the “big, tough, manly man” name generator) and then claim he’s the exact opposite of Ana de Armas’ tough-as-nails CIA agent Sadie. When Evans falls, he doesn’t flail his limbs around like we mere mortals do. When he has to pose as a legendary agent and break bread with the enemy (Adrien Brody’s Leveque), he has a grin on his face that seems a little too confident, a little too controlled. You don’t get the feeling that this guy is sweating at all.

Evans has spent so many years flexing his muscle and charisma in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and has become so at home in the role of the chivalrous superhero, that it’s almost as if he can’t help but slip into the role again and again when the going gets tough. It’s completely at odds with the kind of film director Dexter Fletcher wants to make—which isn’t to say that Evans is necessarily the cause of the film’s flaws. Cole is so thinly characterized that he can only really speak his character traits out loud. “I’m a farmer!” “I don’t like wearing suits!” There’s nothing believable about him at all.

Cole is supposedly a guy who has never left the country (it’s odd how this film treats lack of foreign travel as a red flag for dating) and who is habitually too needy and too smothering in his relationships. At a market stall he meets Sadie (De Armas back in No time to die And The Grey Man mode, only this time she’s wearing a bad wig), whose job requires her to give up all long-term commitments and emotional investments. The two argue about how often one should water houseplants, when really they’re arguing about how well relationships can thrive without constant attention.

They go on a single date, and Cole is shocked when his subsequent texts go unanswered (hence the film’s title). He jumps on a plane to London to try to track down Sadie, only to get caught up in her spy work. And wherever they go and whoever they meet, it’s repeatedly pointed out that Cole and Sadie have a simmering sexual chemistry. “You two need to get a room” is said at least five or six times. At a certain point, it feels like Ghostly tries to brainwash his audience. There is no chemistry, sexual or otherwise. Evans and De Armas have Ghostlybut their film doesn’t seem to understand that an opposites-attract storyline requires passionate disagreements – not the slightly irritated, “I want to speak to your manager” energy teased out of both actors.

Everything else on the topic Ghostly feels like filler: the excessive number of celebrities called in for cameos, Brody’s overly committed but smartly dressed villain, and a trio of action scenes set to random pop hits. None of it makes a difference. Ghostly failed at the first hurdle.

Director: Dexter Fletcher. Cast: Chris Evans, Ana de Armas, Adrien Brody, Mike Moh, Tim Blake Nelson, Marwan Kenzari, Anna Deavere Smith. 12, 116 minutes.

“Ghosted” will stream on Apple TV+