Female Film Critics 24/375
Black Widow is a nice surprise for action fans. This new Marvel movie launches into the espionage and assassin genres with the unblinking verve of a Bourne or a Wick. It’s an unexpected form for an Avengers offshoot to take. But that’s what makes it work.
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There are a number of derivative story elements, but they are packaged in a new and empowering way, even as they stretch our suspension of disbelief to a near-breaking point. Who am I kidding? Marvel is fantasy. Natasha is a super soldier in a world where she’s friends with a Norse God, a man who shrinks to the size of an atom, and a dude who woke up after being frozen in ice for over 50 years.
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Fun on fairly standard action flick level. but look a little deeper, and you’ll see that Cate Shortland is telling a story about women’s agency and right to choose. Not every woman can stick up for herself with knives and acrobatic fight moves, but we can all speak up for our sisters and stand by their side when they need our help. Or a helicopter to fly.
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Cate Shortland’s directorial perspective and prowess are evident in every frame of Black Widow. She has not only created a beautifully crafted and technically impressive flick, she’s planted seeds for serious thought and discourse that make Black Widow meaningful and memorable. You don’t need to be an MCU aficionado to enjoy Black Widow, and it may not make an MCU devotee of you, but film has sufficient substance to maybe make you want to watch it twice.
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Aussie director Cate Shortland (Lore, Berlin Syndrome) proves a capable hand at the rock-em-sock-em action; explosive; outsized violence; and huge dollops of humor that mark the Marvel universe as she brings Black Widow‘s saga to a satisfying close and introduces a new bad-ass superheroine in Florence Pugh’s Yelena Belova.
Read moreIn case we needed another reminder that Hollywood does not care about minority characters or actors, yesterday brought the news
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