Red Sparrow

(Warning: contains spoilers for Red Sparrow)

This is a film that I seem to have seen a trailer for Every.  Single.  Time I've been to the cinema this year.  Following my enjoyment of Atomic Blonde last year, I was keen to see how the fledgling female-action-hero-slash-spy genre was developing.  On the face of it, this looks like it should be the Black Widow movie that we don't seem to be getting.  Ballet dancers, Russia, spy school, kick ass spy woman, young-adult favourite (Jennifer Lawrence) - it sounds like you should be able to slot Scarlett Johansson into the role and it fit within the MCU.  This is not the case.

If that's how codebreaking works, you could spell anything

Red Sparrow is based on the 2013 Jason Matthews novel about Dominika (Jennifer Lawrence) - an acclaimed Russian ballerina whose career is cut short following injury.  She is approached by her (frankly creepy and gross) uncle (Matthian Schoenaerts) who works in Russian intelligence (and is surprisingly forward about mentioning this) and sends her to train with the Sparrows (Russian operatives).  In exchange, she can continue to afford treatment and care for her ill mother.  Lots and lots of Russian double crossing ensues.

I really didn't like this and there are lots of reasons why.  Firstly, I don't think it was marketed correctly.  A casual observer looking at the trailer, the cast, crew (directed by Francis Lawrence of The Hunger Games) and rating (15) may assume that this was for a younger audience, who may be there because of Jennifer Lawrence and the type of films she has previously made (generally pro-women, characters usually defiant under pressure).  The poster doesn't suggest otherwise.  These entirely reasonable assumptions are incorrect.  Lawrence and her colleagues mutter in monotone Russian accents throughout, and all the things that make Lawrence a watchable actress are the things that are stripped out in this film.  I can't imagine watching this as a 15 year old and enjoying it.

Secondly, it is incredibly sexist to both men and women.  Charlotte Rampling's Matron character advises that Sparrows must learn about their targets, and become their missing pieces so that information can be obtained.  But it seems that the only missing piece that a woman can offer is sex.  Which is sexist for everyone.  It's sexist for all the men in this film to whom Dominika essentially says "Vee haff seggs now?" in a flat Russian accent - that not only a) is that the only thing that men want, but b) that's all that has to happen for them to spill all their State secrets.  As for the Sparrow school, the only thing that is taught is sex.  Not languages, self-defence, weaponry, espionage or anything else that may be useful.  Just sex.  Not seduction.  Just sex.  There is an argument that the point of Sparrow School is to weaponise sexuality and for Dominika to reclaim her body and personality after rapes and attempted rapes.  That premise holds for one moment until you remember that if Dominika doesn't go to Sparrow School, she will be murdered because she saw a man be killed (while raping her).  More to the point, it seems to be something that is only taught to the women.  There are men in the classes, but they aren't the ones asked to perform sex acts in front of their peers.

The direction is also muddled.  Francis Lawrence doesn't appear to be showing nudity as titillation (which is good, given the subject matter).  Nudity is perfunctory at best.  The film is incredibly violent to every character, and it is painful, brutal violence rather than the "walk-it-off" violence of most action films.  But...all the men who die horribly, do so fully clothed.  All the women who die are in various states of undress when they are killed.  All the men who are tortured, get tortured bloodlessly and off screen.  When it's the women, the camera points straight at it and doesn't move away.  It's so noticeable that it's strange that the director/writers don't seem to be making any point about this.  Or failing that, it's strange that no one seems to have watched the film and thought "it appears that I am involved in an incredibly misogynistic film here".

J-Law's face usually...

Really odd choices for everyone involved.  The only assumption I can make here is that the studio have some serious dirt that they used as leverage against every person involved in this film.  That's the only way I can explain how this script was allowed to fly the nest.

I prefer this one...

Additional thoughts, questions, comments:

• As with Breaking Bad, this would have been much shorter if the NHS was in place.
• Is Jennifer Lawrence trying to shake her YA persona?  Between this and Mother!, these are two very distinctly different films from her usual "type", and both have been very divisive.
• The ending was pretty decent, but after nearly 2 1/2 hours of dislike, it was too little too late for me.

Passengers

(Warning: contains spoilers for Passengers)

If this picture doesn't go here, the thumbnail for the link will be of T2 which would be very confusing.

I wish trailers could develop the art of showing less.  Over the past year (in particular, for some reason), I've seen a joke, an action sequence, a reveal that would have packed a huge punch if I had been watching it "fresh" for the first time, rather than for the 15th because of trailers.  Here are three examples off the top of my head:

1.  Doctor Strange
Chiwetel Ejiofor's character gives Benedict Cumberbatch's a piece of paper with an unfamiliar word on it. 
"Is this my mantra?" wonders Cumberbatch. 
"No," says Ejiofor "it's the Wifi password.  We're not barbarians."
Nice line the first time.  Diminishing returns.

2.  Trainspotting 2
Spud appears to fall off a high rise building in Edinburgh, before being caught by Renton just before he hits the ground.

What I assume to be a beautiful moment of tension, which I'm now anticipating.

3.  Passengers
Jennifer Lawrence tells Michael Sheen that she and Chris Pratt are on a date.  The camera pans down to show that he is an android, human from the waist up, metal from the waist down.

I mention this, because Sheen's entrance in the film is a surprise and confusion.  Pratt's character, Jim, wakes up on the Avalon, a spaceship on a 120-year mission to reach Homestead II where the 5000 passengers and 247 crew will set up their new home.  A computer glitch leads to Jim's hibernation pod awakening him.  He realises he is 30 years into the journey, no one else is awake, and he has no way of going back to sleep.  In his befuddled state he wanders round this state of the art deck seeing no one until he catches sight of Arthur (Sheen), bartending to nobody.  Conversation ensues, and Arthur doesn't give any clues that the situation is anything less than normal.  Until he goes to pour Jim a drink, and we (and Jim) realise that Arthur is not human.  That would have been a great reveal, had the trailers not told me.
"Just don't watch trailers, then" is the obvious solution.  The problem is that trailers are everywhere.  I saw the trailer for this film, for example, during advert breaks on television, before YouTube videos downloaded, at the cinema waiting for other films to start, on giant screens in the middle of city centres.  It was a trailer that was impossible for me to miss.  Conversely, it also made the film intriguing enough that I wanted to watch it.  No win situation.
The flip of this is that I saw the trailer for La La Land repeatedly since August.  I knew it excited me, I knew wanted to see it, I hadn't a clue what it was about. 
Conclusions:
1.  It is possible to give a spoiler free gist of a film to whet the appetite.
2.  For some reason, the majority of film companies don't like this approach.

Back to Passengers.  I'll be honest, I liked this film a lot more than I was expecting to.  The main criticism I had heard about it was it's ethical dilemma, and I was unsure what to make of it myself.  Jim, after a year by himself, happens upon the hibernation pod of Aurora (Jennifer Lawrence).  He likes the look of her, reads her files and profiles, and then spends a considerable amount of time wrestling with the decision of whether to wake her too and condemn her to the same lonely death as him.  It's not a decision taken lightly, the tipping point coming when Jim finds himself considering suicide.  It is not good for man to be alone.  He wakes her.  I understand that there's been some criticism of this decision.  There are arguments that it's a "bit stalkery" at best, or another example of a man exerting his authority over a passive woman.  I don't think it's an issue because I think the film resolves it. 

Aurora and Jim have a really good time together, until she discovers what he has done and goes berserk.  She challenges what he has done, physically attacks him, and refuses to engage with him further, thus condemning him back to his lonely life.  And for Jim's part?  He agrees with her.  He accepts her response.  He doesn't even try to explain what he's done.  He knows it was - for want of a better phrase - an assault, and not her choice.  He knows he was wrong.  Horrible circumstances led him to make a horrible choice, which has horrible consequences for her - but I think this film and these characters come to resolution about this, which does not excuse his actions.

Yeah, the reason is that you woke her up.
Idiot.

Overall, it's an interesting film and not (in my opinion) deserving of the criticism it got.  It poses a number of interesting questions and ideas - what would you do in similar circumstances, how AI is almost human (but not quite), can anything actually replace human interaction?  Worth seeing, and (as with most space films) worth seeing on a big screen.


Additional thoughts, comments and questions.
1.  The division in passenger types is an interesting gimmick.  Jim is a discounted passenger who can have basic amenities because he has paid for a lower ticket.  Even in his year by himself, he cannot access any of the higher class passenger amenities.

2.  The spaceship malfunctions and tried to kill them.  This seems to happen a lot with spaceships in films.  Maybe we stay on Earth, people.

3.  How well would any of us do if left without company for a year.  Not very well, according to this study:
http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2014/07/people-would-rather-be-electrically-shocked-left-alone-their-thoughts