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A Working Man

2025 film by David Ayer From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

A Working Man
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This article is about the 2025 film. For other uses, see Working Man (disambiguation).

A Working Man is a 2025 action thriller film produced and directed by David Ayer, who co-wrote the screenplay with Sylvester Stallone. It is based on the 2014 novel Levon's Trade by Chuck Dixon. The film stars Jason Statham, Michael Peña, and David Harbour.

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A Working Man was released in the United States by Amazon MGM Studios and in the United Kingdom by Warner Bros. Pictures on March 28, 2025. The film received mixed reviews from critics and grossed $99 million worldwide against a $40 million budget.

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Plot

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Levon Cade, an ex-Royal Marine Commando, works as a construction foreman in Chicago and has a close friendship with the Garcia family – Joe, his wife, Carla, and their daughter, Jenny – that runs the company. However, he struggles to gain custody of his daughter, Merry, after his wife committed suicide. Merry is now living with Levon’s father-in-law, Jordan, who refused to let him see Merry when he was deployed.

One night, while Jenny is out with friends, she is kidnapped by Russian traffickers Viper and Artemis. Joe and Carla report their missing daughter to the police, but they are unable to find any leads to Jenny. Desperate, the parents offer Levon a sum of money to help them find their daughter, but Levon refuses, citing that he wants to move on from his military life. Still unsure, Levon consults his old friend, Gunny, a blind ex-Marine Raider, who suggests doing what is right for the Garcia family, so Levon agrees to bring her back home. He tracks Jenny's last location in the bar where she was hanging out with her friends. He follows the bartender, Johnny, back to his home and interrogates him before two more thugs arrive. Levon kills all three of them and learns that the bartender and the thugs are working for the Bratva, a Russian mafia crime syndicate with Symon Kharchenko as the enforcer.

Symon's high-ranking captain, Wolo Kolisnyk, discovers the carnage and has a clean-up crew remove the evidence, but Levon follows him to his private estate where he interrogates Wolo before drowning him in his private pool. Symon learns of Levon's activities and sends his sons Danya and Vanko to kill Levon.

Using his contacts from the DEA, Levon infiltrates the organization by pretending to be a dealer to get close to Wolo's son Dimi, who runs the trafficking part of the organization with a biker gang and their leader, Dutch. However, Danya and Vanko chase Levon and manage to capture him (aided by two corrupt cops), but Levon kills them and crashes the van into a river. Symon learns of his sons' deaths and summons the other high-ranking mafia members to exact revenge on Levon. He gets all of Levon's personal information, including his father-in-law and Merry. Symon sends his men to tie up Jordan and set his home ablaze to kill him, but Levon manages to save him. Levon takes Merry to stay with Gunny while he heads out to fight the mafia.

Levon brutally interrogates Dimi and gets him to lead him to the compound where Jenny is being kept before he executes Dimi. He gears up and attacks the compound, killing every criminal in his path, including Dutch and his biker gang. Levon finds Jenny, and kills the client and Viper, while Jenny strangles Artemis. Symon arrives to see Levon and Jenny riding away, and calls for backup; however, his boss orders him to leave Levon alone because of how dangerous Levon is and can bring down the mafia, and that nobody in the organization is going to help him in his crusade for vengeance if he goes rogue. Symon declares he will seek revenge on Levon.

Levon reunites Jenny with her family and returns home to have dinner with Merry and Gunny.

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Cast

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Production

Sylvester Stallone originally developed an adaptation of the Chuck Dixon novel Levon's Trade as a television series with Balboa Productions.[5] The project changed into a film that was up for sale at the 2023 American Film Market, where the film was first announced to have David Ayer attached to direct and Jason Statham to star.[6] In January 2024, Amazon MGM Studios acquired U.S. and select international distribution rights to the film from Black Bear International, which sold the film to independent distributors elsewhere.[7] The film was put into development in part due to its potential for subsequent entries given the number of novels written by Dixon in the series.[8]

In April 2024, David Harbour, Michael Peña, Jason Flemyng, Arianna Rivas, Noemi Gonzalez, Emmett J. Scanlan, Eve Mauro, Maximilian Osinski, Kristina Poli, Andrej Kaminsky, and Isla Gie joined the cast in undisclosed roles.[9]

Principal photography began in April 2024 in London.[9][10] Filming also took place at Winnersh Film Studios in Berkshire, where it wrapped on May 31.[11]

Release

In April 2024, the film was set to be released in the United States on January 17, 2025.[9] In December 2024, the title was changed from Levon's Trade to A Working Man, with a new release date of March 28, 2025. The theatrical release also included engagements in 4DX, Dolby Cinema and D-Box.[12]

Reception

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Box office

As of May 22, 2025, A Working Man has grossed $37 million in the United States and Canada, and $62 million in other territories for a worldwide total of $99 million.[2][3]

In the United States and Canada, A Working Man was released alongside The Woman in the Yard, The Penguin Lessons, and Death of a Unicorn, and was projected to gross $10–12 million from 3,262 theaters in its opening weekend.[13] The film made $5.6 million on its first day, including an estimated $1.1 million from Thursday night previews. It went on to slightly overperform and debut to $15.5 million, topping the box office.[14][15] In its second weekend, the film made $7.3 million (a drop of 53%), finishing second behind newcomer A Minecraft Movie.[16][17]

Critical response

On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, 47% of 154 critics' reviews are positive, with an average rating of 4.9/10. The website's consensus reads: "An efficient action flick that delivers on the meat and potatoes of a Jason Statham vehicle while skimping out on the personality, A Working Man clocks in and out without much fuss or flair."[18] Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 52 out of 100, based on 31 critics, indicating "mixed or average" reviews.[19] Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B" on an A+ to F scale.[14]

In a 2 out of 5 star review for The Guardian, Jesse Hassenger wrote: "At its best, a movie like A Working Man functions as an update to the hard-boiled detective story, with a resilient bruiser conducting his own off-books missing-person investigation. [...]. But Stallone and Ayer don't have the patience for too much skullduggery; skullsmashery is more their thing, and as an action movie, A Working Man doesn't reach the giddy highs of Statham's best."[20]

In a review for The Hollywood Reporter, Frank Scheck praised the acting, particularly Harbour's, but stated: "The film feels overlong at nearly two hours, with repetitiveness settling in early. But it does have its enjoyable eccentric touches, several of which smack of Stallone, who often infuses his portrayals with subtle humor."[21]

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References

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