3 Short Paragraphs: Hanna

2011, Joe Wright (from Atonement and Pride & Prejudice to this? neat!) -- cinema

I admit, most of the images I saw of Saoirse Ronan as Hanna, I was thinking she was going to be Katniss Everdeen in The Hunger Games. I also heard all the comparisons to faery tales and was thinking, "Is Red Riding Hood also about a girl who knows how to kill?" Given that I also had other movies about people who kill real good on the mind (upcoming "reviews" of Knight & Day and Killers) I can be forgiven for a bit of confusion about the matter.

Hanna is style. I won't go so far as to say it was style without substance but it is sort of lacking in the engaging plot. Months later I left with pretty much what I was left with a few short hours after I saw the movie. Memories of the forest her father was raising her in (the woodcutter?), memories of the breakout scene (they shipped her to Arizona that quick? Er, pay attention TBIT) and the final kill-the-evil-queen battle in the enchanted forest. They are all so well done, the scenes along with the great music choices were long lasting.

But I think they could have focused more on a girl who wanted to be real, who wanted to be normal. We were never shown a normal life that she wanted to attain. Yeah yeah, that was the point -- there is no normal -- but I would have liked for her to see some mundanity and be given the choice whether she wanted to attain it or not. We didn't need some happily ever after but a little expression of ever after would have been nice.

(now read Graig's take)