3 Short Paragraphs: Charlie's Angels

2019, Elizabeth Banks (Pitch Perfect 2) -- download

Why did I watch this movie? Why did I make the actual effort and download this movie? Let's be honest here. Why do any of these movies get made? Sorry, let me be less facetious as there are many reasons female centric light action movies get made, but that was not my point. We could say I wouldn't be expected to see this movie, for as Elizabeth Banks (who acted, produced, wrote and directed the movie) puts it, men don't go see women do action movies. But again, honestly I didn't know she did the movie until I saw the credits role, and against honestly, that wouldn't have swayed me one way or another. But we can probably agree I do actually gravitate to female oriented action flicks, whether they be created to please men (which I honestly thought was the reason for this one), or agnostic to gender and social implications. But why did I see this movie? Well, because of pretty young women in exotic locales doing action movie tropes. I wasn't expecting John Wick just some distraction and I got it.

Banks takes the previous elements of the franchise and turns them on their head. The Townsend Agency is now more than a California based PI firm, but an international organization with ... well, I really have no idea what's its agenda was, but it was altruistic and extremely well funded. The original Bosley (retconned to be Patrick Stewart in all versions of the franchise) is now Bosley 001 and all his supporting counterparts, including Elizabeth Banks' character are also Bosleys. The women of the org are the Angels. Right off the bat you see she wrote the movie to focus on how men just underestimate what women are capable of. Well Not All Men but most, and the Townsend Agency takes advantage of this in the field. It was a decent focus, having them be All Sexy All the Time as a role not as a weakness. The problem is that the message is too much a cartoon hammer to the head, instead of nuanced. but for a rare moment when we are presented with a woman who runs a smuggling ring of goods women in Turkey cannot access easily, such as birth control and pregnancy tests.

Alas, the movie matches (at least my) expectations in being a dumb action flick. The Red Herring is a magical technological doohickey that is supposed to provide cheap limitless power to the world, but the Bad Guys just want to use it to assassinate people. Once they actually show how difficult it is to implement, the Bad Guys should have realized it was more feasible to just go back to shooting people. Besides limitless power could do pretty well in Evil Lairs. But to be honest (cuz, in this post, it was all I could be) I rather liked the angels -- even Kristen Stewart in a role that could have been Miley Cyrus, was not as annoying as she usually is -- she actually looked like she was having some fun. It was definitely light and action packed, but if Banks wanted to do a proper movie to reboot the franchise and make her name (since McG didn't do so well at it) I would have gone for grittier, more Jason Bourne and made a serious statement on the seriously evil incel / 4chan anti-women movements out there.