What is the plot - in one sentence? We follow a woman who is arrested for killing a cop, and then trained as an assassin by a vague yet menacing government organisation.
I don't have time, just spoil it for me? There's a very strange relationship with her boss, she falls in love with some little guy, and manages to do... two other missions in a few years before she has to flee after a bungled hit. She leaves the two men in her life to miss her.
What is the meaning of the title? The Woman Nikita, She's a woman called Nikita.
The things she screamed like this, were about 4 x the volume I thought possible. A dog living 4 doors away from me died because of it.
Anything that's not
aged well? Does a woman get slapped around? It's 1990, so part of her
montage of training involves being taught to learn how to use a
computer mouse for several minutes. Other than the ridiculous
fashion (she wears a hat with holes in it, like Swiss cheese,once), and the
technology (giant walkie talkies, enormous security cameras etc)
probably the more interesting thing is the gender politics, and the
director. We'll talk about that later, but let's just say it's not aged well... as for slapping around,
she is slapped around at the beginning of the movie by a detective,
she's also happy to dish it out.
Any thoughts? The actor playing Nikita was a lover of the director (more on that later) and she's not up to the task. She starts off as a literal junkie, with violent tendancies, and there's no reason to wonder why she's been selected for the task of being an assassin. We are also told that she's turning 19, but she's an attractive 30 if she's a day.
Her acting isn't up to much, and there are a few lines which she screams 'MY NAME IS CUTIE!' 'MOTHERFUCKERS!' and 'OPEN THE DOOR MOTHERFUCKER!' which had her voice crack and I didn't know what was going on. Another time she said it with a mouse, and then sings like a psychopath, and I really didn't get what we're meant to think. It certainly wasn't charming. Half the time she's unstable, the other half she's a deadly and collected assassin.
She's taken to a top secret location to be trained in assassination (in two weeks!), and there she's ... taught ballet and allowed to spray paint her room. Meanwhile, the guy in charge, and in complete control of her, falls in love with her. He looks like a French Kenneth Brannagh, and their relationship is entirely inappropriate (more on that later). Put it this way, if you throw a birthday party with cake, and there's only two of you, and only one of you can go home, because the birthday girl is effectively a prisoner, there's no way that you aren't a creep.
The other guy she falls in love with (a cashier turned boat builder, because why not?) seems to be an earnest and supportive lover, but there's a bit where he won't let her have a bath, and is happy with her having no friends. He's also very interested in what she was like as a small child. Something was up there, no question.
Despite the notable handicap of having no friends, she's able to source together a crew for her final mission. One of them ends up being Jean Reno, who gives a worrying performance.
Would you recommend this? No I would not. Her missions in total are: deliver some surveillance equipment to a room, two assassination jobs, and a bungled hit on the embassy, for 2 hours. It's not exactly fast paced. I'll drop this now: if this was in English, it would be almost unwatchable.
Is it a precursor to various movies where a woman kicks ass? Yeah, but they've done it better since, and probably better before too.
Final thoughts? This already felt a bit off just in watching it. It's not a good action movie, and it's not a good romance movie. The whole thing felt either stupid or creepy. After that, and reading about the director, I feel even worse. For the record, the director is Luc Besson, whom we discovered before is a perv. I mentioned in the last post that I'd try to watch more non-American movies, now I'll try to watch more non-peadophile-made movies. In theory, I'd be willing be overlook a lot from a director, but his creepiness has seeped into the movie itself, and it's not even a good movie. This was grim, and a grim reminder that so much of the art we consume is made by objectionable pieces of shit.
Also, one of her missions involved making a room service delivery? I've had dogs do that.
Ooh boy, 66 done, the other 65 will be here too. Any more in the future will be there too, because of the magic of the internet.
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