badass

Despite its overtly referential title, Joe Carnahan’s unrelenting, made-for-Hulu murder-fest, Boss Level, actually isn’t as desperate to appeal to gamers as one might think. There are a handful of references to video games here and there, and the movie’s time-loop plot device does evoke the low-stakes, repetitive experience of playing games. But this is no Pixels—it’s a blistering action movie first, a middling sci-fi movie second, and, surprisingly, a delayed coming of age story in its fleeting moments of respite. Frank Grillo stars as Roy Pulver, an ex-special forces badass who for reasons unknown relives the same day repeatedly, ducking…