Hanna


Title:Hanna
Rating: 3.5/5
Genre: Action, Thriller, Mystery
Starring: Saoirse Ronan, Cate Blanchett, Eric Bana
Director: Joe Wright

Welcome to one of possibly the only mini reviews i'll write. Why mini you ask? Cos i'm on a motherfuckin' plane! No snakes though. Just grumpy turks. Probably for the best... And so even on my voyages abroad I cant help but be tantalised by this flick on the flight menu - you can take the reviewer away from his pc but you can't the...euhm, I guess I didn't think that one through, but you get the idea - that I have intended to watch for a long time but never got the chance. You see, this ain't our standard popcorn action flick or predictable thriller (ok, its a little predictable) but a tale of a young girl and her voyages into the world of assassins.

But before you get all 'leon' on me, hanna ain't quite done that way around. This isn't a girl entering the world of assassins as much as it is an assassin told to go play in the world once hidden from her. Wanted dead as a baby, she was rescued at the last minute by bond-a-like secret agent to be trained in the harsh winter wilderness to survive the onslaught of those who will do anything in their power to kill both her and her father. For absolutely no reason whatsoever. Zip. Nada. I mean, some vague hogwash reason at the end emerges but really all it does is make me wonder if they didn't try anything whether she wouldnt just grow up as a normal girl. I'm skirting around spoilers now so i'll stop, but suffice to say there are more than a couple of plot holes in this tale, and i'm not just referring to the ability to shoot a moose and rip out its intestines without spilling any blood, or the telekinetic arrow shooting that occurs towards the end. There are points that admittedly might have an explanation in the story somewhere which I missed, but it's all done in such a way as to never readily permit the viewer to know the explanation.

But i'm all for ignoring plot holes, and it's interesting how the rest of the film actually held up. Indeed, I remember it being billed largely as an action flick with some thriller elements tossed in. It seems odd then to say that this alone would have made for a pretty mediocre and uninteresting film. Instead it is Hanna herself that takes the main focus, the acting - and the abilities of our fresh-faced young starlet does surprisingly well at holding up her, rather significant, end of the film - combined with the direction capable of showing a character that is more than just a mindless machine but a young girl, and the humour in taking an assassin shielded from the world and slapping her in the middle of nowhere is not lost on the director.

There is a dramatic element as we come to not necessarily understand or empathise, but simply care for the well being of this young girl faced with an impossible situation. There are snippets of conversation about how shes never heard music or had a friend, drilling home what shes been forced to become as we try to get into her mindset. This is where the films finds its strength and where it finds itself standing out from the crowd. Even at 2 hours it never feels long, and could have easily benefitted from an extended run time, extending the action and further explaining the nuances of the plot. It's just a shame it never quite feels like everything it could have been.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Female Prisoner: Scorpion

Image
Title: Female Prisoner: Scorpion Rating: 4/5 Genre: Drama, Thriller, Crime Starring: Meiko Kaji, Rie Yokoyama, Isao Natsuyagi Director: Shunya Ito Language: Japanese It was the 70s that saw the rise in Japanese grindhouse cinema (also known as ‘Pinky Violence); tired of the very ‘traditional’ style of many local films, and with the rise in success of Hollywood titles such as ‘Dirty Harry’ and ‘The Great Escape,’ a new wave of daring and experimental directors came to light. Armed with a low budget and all the influences of the early Western grindhouse cheap gore flicks, they combined it with traditional Japanese film-making sensibilities to create a style that somehow succeeded in being both artistic in style whilst retaining those cheap traditions such as gratuitous nudity and violence to result in something rather unique. And it was with this, the first instalment in the ‘Female Prisoner’ series, that would influence a wave known as ‘Women in Prison’ films; with a strong the...
Read more

Slasher Hunter

Image
Title: Slasher Hunter (2011) Rating: 3/5 Genre: Horror, Comedy Starring: Chad Phillips, Derek Rothermund, Ryan Sullivan Director: Steve Rudzinski Duration: 35 mins Four pals are planning to have a great weekend of sex and brews in an old cabin in the woods. Now, I know what you’re thinking: “this is the exact set up to every slasher movie from ‘79 to ‘99; this can’t end well.” Well our group of campers have thought of that, that’s why they brought sci-fi nerd Lee along for the ride who carries within him the so-called “survivor gene.” This special gene helps prevent him from being the unfortunate victim of any slasher maniacs that may be lurking about. Unfortunately this gene is also highly coveted by a group of the most dastardly slashers around: Frank, Larry, Jay, Charles, Pleatherface, and Puzzle (I didn’t say their names were very dastardly, did I?). It’s up to a renegade, federally-employed Slasher Hunter to thwart the slashers’ plan and save Lee and his friends before it’...
Read more

Chinese Erotic Ghost Story

Image
Title: Chinese Erotic Ghost Story Original Title: Yuk lui liu chai Genre: Comedy, Exploitation Rating: 2.5/5 Starring: Ben Ko Chu, Chun Chung, Siu Wan Hung Director: Kin-Nam Cho Language: Chinese It's always a little tricky to think how these sort of films should be rated; from the title it's apparent that they aren't perhaps the most creative when it comes to titles, though if nothing else it certainly is an accurate one, with perhaps some mention of how batshit insane the bizarre events of the actual film are being the only thing missing. It all kicks off rather normally; Chu is introduced as the debt collector working for an asshole of a King with a beautiful mistress, two beautiful daughters and an even prettier wife, whilst he's stuck with a woman who sleeps 20 hours a day and spends the remaining four awake eating. Caught in the embrace of one of the King's daughters he's punished with the task of entering Satan's Temple and stealing the statu...
Read more