(ESP-ENG) Canary Black | Espionage and betrayal - Movie Review!
Hello friends, good vibes to all.
Who doesn't remember the Underworld or Van Helsing movies where Kate Beckinsale showed us all her skills in a combination between John Wick and Blade, films that I think are mostly quite acceptable since we saw a combination between John Wick and Blade itself. Expecting to see Kate again in 2024 in a role that may not be the same as those but showing how good an action actress she can be, at least for me, was a pleasant surprise. Canary Black is an action and espionage movie with all the clichés you can imagine in this genre but it is still very entertaining. As always the critics massacred this film, it's not the best but it's certainly not a disaster either.
This plot focuses on Avery Graves (Kate Beckinsale), a female spy belonging to the CIA and that as almost always happens leads a double life which her husband is unaware of. Avery is the best in her class both physically and mentally, hence her effectiveness and efficiency when doing any mission or operation is 100%. But things don't always go well for her and one day her husband is kidnapped in her own house with the purpose of getting to her and making her more vulnerable. This is when the blackmail begins and the terrorists who have her husband want a favor in exchange for the man's life.
In this film we will see the great Ray Stevenson in one of his last works before passing away, here he plays Avery's boss (Jarvis Hedlund), a tough guy who runs a wing of the CIA that handles this type of agents and special missions; besides being a close friend of Graves. The thing is that at this point in the plot, betrayals are everywhere and trusting becomes very complicated. Given the danger of the “favor”, what these terrorists are looking for is for this agent to betray her own country by getting a file that could unleash a government disaster. As you can see, it couldn't be more cliché, all the elements expected of this type of story are present without exception.
The plot is everything you can imagine, it's action packed, chases, shootings, clandestinity, espionage, etc etc etc. From the beginning it keeps you connected, it's like the preamble of what's to come. The story has the appearance of being super linear but the reality is that it is not because there are a couple of plot twists that I think make the plot very interesting, I think that without them if we would be facing a very bad product. The only thing I could reproach a little is the script, there are some things that do not fit or at least could have been done differently, there are gaps out there that one has to fill them with assumptions because they never give a context as to why.
Inexplicable is also the name they decided on for the film. For those who don't know, there is a character in the DC Comics universe called Black Canary, a heroine who also happens to have yellow hair. Obviously it is impossible to confuse one thing with the other, but if they could have chosen another name, this one seems very strange to me. A marketing genius or a complete disaster? Beyond this it must be said that the action scenes, melee and even a chase that takes place in the center of Zagreb in Croatia were well done, I have no complaints, they are not worthy of a top cinema but to entertain are more than fine.
Beckinsale, as I said, is a very good actress for this kind of roles, here we are not going to value the acting as such because being a pure action film, the performances are a little aside. There are some parts of drama and confusion but nothing remarkable. Ray Stevenson as always was very good at what he did, here his character is more bureaucratic than anything else but it was always very cool to see him on screen. Without much more to say about this section what remains is to clarify that this is a pure entertainment movie, one of those you see when you have an hour and a half to spare and you don't want to get bored.
It's an extremely cliché film, with some gaps but it's perfectly watchable, it won't be one of James Bond but the entertainment is guaranteed. I give it a 6/10. After reading some things I expected worse but at least I feel like I didn't waste my time or get bored. It's a little over an hour and a half long and it's on Prime Video. I leave the trailer here.
¡Un abrazo a todos, nos vemos en la próxima!
Well friends that's all for today, I hope you liked it.
¡A hug to everyone, see you next time!