Red Sparrow is a movie that probably would’ve done better on Netflix. This isn’t a jab at Red Sparrow and I’m also not one who believes that the big screen should be reserved only for bombastic extravaganzas. On the contrary, I push my friends and family, much to their annoyance, to watch all movies in cinemas, whether it’s a big budgeted Michael Bay ejaculation or a weird art house thumbsucker. But I have an inkling that people are going to walk out of this Francis Lawrence film saying “Wtf was that?” and proceed to not-recommend their friends to watch it.
Most people are going to head into this movie expecting the next big flamboyant action spectacle like Atomic Blonde or John Wick. Some of y’all are hoping this will be the Black Widow movie we’ve always wanted. If you’re one of those people, you’re going to be utterly disappointed. As Sam Jackson says in Kingsman: The Secret Service:
This is a dense espionage thriller that focuses more on smaller character beats than it does large action set pieces. In fact, there are literally NO action sequences in this movie at all; Not the conventional shoot ’em up type, anyway. We follow Dominika (Jennifer Lawrence), a promising ballerina who breaks her leg in a tragic onstage accident — or is it? — leaving her career in ruins, without a penny to her name and a sick mother to take care of. The scene is dark, shocking and brutal, serving as a disclaimer: This ain’t no “John Wick”, biatch! Everything else from this point on will only get darker.
Her uncle, Vanya (Matthias Schoenaerts), who works for Russian Intelligence recruits Dominika to ‘Sparrow school’ where she learns to turn her body into a weapon. Red Sparrow is directed by Francis Lawrence, the dude who helmed the latter three Hunger Games movies, including the best one, Catching Fire. Now after three years, the Lawrences — no, they’re not related — reunite once more. Here we see what Francis Lawrence is capable of without the constraints of PG 13.
Guys, this is not a fun movie — the more accurate adjectives would be “uncomfortable” and “traumatising”. But it is a film that I was engrossed in from start to finish. Red Sparrow is a cold procedural that’s about sacrifice, manipulation, and deceit. And while I would have loved to see Jennifer Lawrence whoop asses for 2 hours straight, this is a welcome change from your usual spy adventures.
The Sparrow Academy offers some of the best parts of the film. Unlike in a lot of spy movies, we don’t see our lead character pick up a gun and miss her target at the start of her training, followed by a fist-pumping montage sequence where she does pull-ups, learns martial arts, shoots at the targets but misses, more pull-ups, more ass-kicking, shoots the targets and hits the white areas, more pull-ups — this time one handed — more martial arts — this time blindfolded — and finally hits the bullseye, repeatedly. Here, using your body as a weapon isn’t about learning how to punch a man in the face. It’s about manipulation by seduction; How do you get a man (or woman) to dance to your beat.
The training sequences in Sparrow school which are lead by a stern lady known only as ‘Matron’, (played coldly by the Charlotte Rampling) involve breaking you down mentally until you’re nothing but a shell of your former self, and then rebuilding you back up again as an emotionless, cold-hearted walking weapon who, upon command, would drop to your knees and give blowjobs to the creepiest of people. Most of these scenes had me gasping, squirming in my seat and literally say whaaat the f*ck aloud.
“Take of your clothes”, Matron tells Dominika and her fellow classmate, on the first day of school, in a matter-of-factly tone. Dominika is shocked and appalled by the request. Her classmate, who’s clearly used to it removes his clothes without question. Matron glares at Dominika disapprovingly. In another sequence, Matron brings a handcuffed sex offender to class. She tells another student to get on her knees and service him. Red Sparrow is a very uncomfortable and disturbing watch and that is me putting it lightly.
There are a number of nude scenes, sex scenes, and rape scenes, all censored by our annoying censorship board. Which sucks, because these scenes are vital to the narrative and tone of the film. But even with the jarring cuts, there is a sense of eeriness surrounding those sequences. But of course, this movie isn’t “Life and Times at Sparrow Academy”. Eventually, Dominika graduates and this is where the movie falls slightly apart.
She’s sent on a mission (or is it numerous missions) but what exactly the mission is, is rather unclear, but it involves extracting information from a United States CIA agent, Nate Nash (Joel Edgerton), who’s in cahoots with a Russian mole. There are plenty of twists and turns that happen throughout, some of them make sense, some of them are head scratches, most of them are fun.
But despite its various convoluted story beats that drag the movie down, the movie still succeeds because Francis Lawrence constantly reminds us that this isn’t necessarily a cat and mouse story, but a glimpse into the dangerous (possibly hopefully exaggerated) lives of Russian spies. There are a couple of torture sequences that will have you grab your partner’s arm as tight as you can (or in my loser ass’ case, the armrest).
I didn’t jump on board the JLaw hype train like most people did many years ago. I don’t get why people adore her oh so much. She’s mostly good, but her nonchalant performance in “X-Men: Apocalypse” annoys the heck out of me to this day. But this my friend, is a GREAT performance. I’ve never seen Lawrence this note-perfect, not since “American Hustle”. Yes, I watched “Mother” and yes, she is awesome there. Here, she is better. She puts everything on the table, holding nothing back. This is a raw and powerful performance! I love it.
Red Sparrow suffers because at times it gets too convoluted that you stop trying to figure out what on earth Dominika’s doing. I get the feeling that even the writer, Justin Haythe did not know where he was going with it. But overall, this is one worth checking out.
Red Sparrow feels like an anti-James Bond. It’s a tale where spies are not presented as cool cats driving fancy cars, but one where our lead character wakes up every day hating the hell hole that she’s stuck in. You watch James Bond and you think, “I wish I could be a secret agent one day,” you watch Red Sparrow and you’ll think, “Thank God I’m a fu*king postman.”
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