Kevin James shaves his head and picks up a pistol in Guns Up trailer

Kevin James and Christina Ricci are a couple of killers in the first trailer for Guns Up.

By Matt Schimkowitz  |  June 24, 2025 | 6:33pm
Screenshot: YouTube
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Kevin James shaves his head and picks up a pistol in Guns Up trailer
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Paul Blart is Mall Cop no more. In Guns Up, Kevin James does what all 60-year-old movie stars do these days and headlines a Taken-style shoot-em-up about a seemingly normal man with a particular set of skills. Birthed out of the John Wick primordial ooze that gave us Nobody and Fight Or Flight, Guns Up sees James as a retired cop who moonlights as a bone-breaking debt collector for the mob. This gives him all the more reason to shave his head and enlist his wife (Christina Ricci, showing off her axe-throwing skills) in a little urban warfare as they protect their recently purchased diner.

Here’s the synopsis:

“On the brink of leaving ‘The Family,’ a mob henchman’s final job goes off the rails. With the clock ticking, the ex-cop has one night to get his unsuspecting family out of the city before he gets snuffed out.”

James doesn’t make many movies these days. His last role was in Monster Summer, opposite the infamously normal Mel Gibson. He also starred in several seemingly nonexistent Netflix sports comedies, including something called The Crew, in which James starred as the new head of a NASCAR pit crew, and Home Team, as the new coach of a pee-wee football team. Like The Crew and Home Team, his latest, Guns Up, has a sticky title designed to cling to the memories of everyone who sees it.

Director Edward Drake says the film is “a love letter to every parent who sacrificed their dreams so they could support their families.” Who didn’t have parents working for the mob to keep food on the table? We salute the Tony Sopranos out there, making the tough decisions of where to hide a body so that A.J. could stay swimming in ziti.

Guns Up comes out on July 18.

 
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