‘HEART of Stone’ is the latest action thriller on Netflix that critics would love to vilify but our family had a fun evening watching it. Directed by Tom Harper, the British director known for the BBC “War and Peace” mini-series, the movie is about a double agent, Rachel Stone (Gal)

who works both for the British intelligence agency MI6 and a shadowy organization of self appointed peacekeepers known as the Charter. Their objective is to protect the Heart, a very powerful device that can be used for evil deeds if it falls into the wrong hands.

The Heart is the latest MacGuffin used in the movies, a term coined by Alfred Hitchcock that describes a basic plot element that helps drive a film’s narrative forward. Best examples are the ring in

“The Lord of the Rings” trilogy, the lost ark and the dial of destiny in the Indiana Jones movies, and the advanced AI called the Entity in the latest “Mission Impossible” movie.

“Heart of Stone” starts with a big action set piece in the wintry Italian Alps. A team of MI6 operatives intends to get an international arms dealer, Mulvaney (Enzo Cilenti). The team is composed of agents Parker (Jamie Dornan), Bailey (Paul Ready), Yang (Jing Lusi) and Gal as Rachel Stone, who’s part of their tech support.

The mission goes south when Mulvaney’s bodyguard thwarted Yang in injecting him with a drug that will give him a fake heart attack. But Parker is able to abduct Mulvaney and drag him until they get inside a cable car.

Gal, who is not supposed to go out of their van during missions as a computer tech expert, pretends she hurt her foot so she can go on her own while the MI6 team tries to help Parker with Mulvaney, but it all ends in disaster.

The next big action scene happens in Lisbon, Portugal, where a young hacker, Keya (Alia Bhatt, Indian actress of “RRR” in her first Hollywood outing), who has the Heart, is going. The Heart is a highly advanced computer that can take over any other computer system and enable anyone who owns it to control the whole world.

Again, the Lisbon episode ends in disaster, when Gal and her team are attacked by various armed men. Gal can very well escape on her own but she chooses to help and rescue her teammates. This is a time for a big reveal and we ourselves are so shocked by the unpredictable turn of events.

As an action extravaganza, this is on the level of another Netflix thriller that has already become a franchise, “Extraction”. Gal is the second female action star on the streaming channel after Charlize Theron did “The Old Guard”, which has an element of fantasy in it and is also having a sequel released soon.

Both movies offer solid action sequences (never mind if they’re aided by CGI), stunning stuntwork and confounding twists and surprises in the plotting. For “Heart of Stone”, it all works because Gal Gadot has such a distinctive screen presence that, no matter what her role is, you cannot help but root for her.

Gal never really disappears into a role, but we honestly think she’s even better here than when she’s playing superhero Wonder Woman. She can very well be the female version of Ethan Hunt, John Wick, or even James Bond.

She will certainly be up to the task. As her primary adversary, Jamie Dornan keeps his clothes on as Parker and fans of his “Fifty Shades” movie will be disappointed as he’s not playing the male lead. We’ve seen him in the musical comedy “Barb and Star in the Vista del Mar”, and he surprised us with great performance in the song and dance numbers.

Also giving great support are Sophie Okonedo as Nomad, the head of Charter, and Matthias Schweighofer (the German actor who’s so good in the horror comedy “Army of Thieves”) as Gal’s contact in the Charter who uses an advanced virtual interface that makes the one in “Minority Report” look so inferior.

The movie is fast paced at 2 hours, unlike most other flicks that run for three hours with many parts that tend to drag. The movie is shot in various location. Aside from the snowy Italian Alps, there’s also the desert in Senegal, plus Lisbon and Iceland. What’s nice is that they are not used as exotic backdrops but they are utilized by the characters in full-throttle, spectacular action scenes.

And oh yes, there’s an additional surprise. Glenn Close popping up in one scene in a cameo role. We really like Glenn Close who’s been nominated eight times for the Oscar but has yet to win even once.