3ish Shortish Paragraphs: Black Widow

Cate Shortland (Lore) -- download

Second viewing now complete, and I am still of two minds about this movie. One, I still pretty much prefer all the non-mega-action aspects of the movie, and two, despite having no key issues with the movie, it just doesn't leave much of an impression on me. 

That last point disappoints me, because while this is an outlier on the MCU movie stream -- set in "the past", pre-Snappening and not being an origin story or sequel -- she is a beloved character by many MCU fans, and I was hoping this would be the first in a series of stand-alone non-origin stories about the characters; that were not sequels. Alas, it this won't encourage that path.

The movie is set just after the Avengers all head in different directions, the fallout from the Civil War Sokovia Accords. Natasha Romanov is on the run, hiding out in Europe but becomes embroiled in a conspiracy from her past. Unbeknownst to her, the espionage  organization she was part of (the Red Room) was not destroyed, but has been active since she defected. And her sister Yelena was deep within it, until recently released from its control (actual mind control) by a chemical counter-agent. She seeks Natasha's help in freeing the rest of the Black Widows from the control of Dreykov, leader of the Red Room.

This plot gave the movie an opportunity to resurrect the style and tone that made the Winter Soldier so popular, even with non-MCU fans. Alas, the movie shifts continually between hints of that tone, and that of a standard action-packed MCU movie. These tonal shifts are likely mandated now, and behind the scenes talk about how these movies are made, tell a story that the directors / screen-writers are often presented with these action set-pieces as required parts. They are created, controlled and inserted by the MCU studio heads, almost as independent components. It must be a challenge making the pure centres of the director's artistic vision come together with the MCU bits. In this case, I am not sure it worked.

But still, I enjoyed Shortland's vision when I could see it. This is a movie about trauma, and the ramifications of not dealing with it. Natasha and Yelena began their young lives in a lie, a lie where they were inserted as a family in Ohio, to infiltrate a SHIELD base. The girls were there to just provide backstory for the infil family. And when the mission was accomplished, they were extracted in the most harsh way, torn from their lives, torn from each other and sent to become tools of the Red Room. Years later, Natasha has extracted herself from that past, and found a new family in the Avengers. But Yelena literally is just released from the Red Room's control at the beginning of the movie, and probably is having the first free thoughts of her adult life. That old trauma, and the awareness of what she has been for more than a decade is still new and raw and overwhelming. Shortland handles it gently and succinctly, peppering it with some of the ludicrous aspects of being in a superhero world.

And yeah, Yelena is the best thing about this movie, even ignoring my very blatant fondness of Florence Pugh (this October, Kent, finally I will see Midsommar). Even while under the control of the Red Room she must have been using humour to deal with her trauma. Her quips, said in that low not-bad-not-great Russian accented drawl, are the observations of someone seeing the world for the first time, or at least in a very new light, and having an opinion on everything.

Meanwhile, Natasha doesn't really seem to be starring in her own movie. Nothing really stands out in any of her actions or reactions, she isn't given anything solid to truly define her. And considering this is the last movie they can do with her, its a real disservice to the character. Sure, she kicks ass and is her usual extremely competent self, but its all by-the-comic-book and almost nothing in the movie expands her character. There was this brief hint at the beginning, which I wish had gone on longer, where she is isolated in the Scandinavian wilderness, where she intends on hiding until the Civil War works itself out. I would have liked seeing this go so far as to give us Natasha without goals, without the Avengers, without that camaraderie with Hawkeye. What would she do with her time? Who would she be? But no, we are literally tossed back into the MCU via the immediate introduction of Taskmaster, the toss away Marvel comics foe assigned to this movie.

In the end, I have nothing against this movie, and nothing about it bothers me in any particular way. Its a competent MCU movie. But given the source character, it should have been so much more.