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In the days leading up to the collapse of the Berlin Wall, an MI6 agent undertakes a mission to recover highly-sensitive material from within East Berlin.
Balancing style with substance is tough - constructing a deliberate imbalancing might actually be tougher. It certainly seems that way with Atomic Blonde, a solo feature from John Wick co-director David Leitch. It's certainly unapologetic about mixing and matching authentic 1980s aesthetics with 2010s retro-fetishistic exaggerations of the same, creating a world that goes from Cold War desaturation to New Wave decadence at the drop of a needle. This also applies to a plot that stumbles along the fine line between stark spy drama and lurid action thriller, following Charlize Theron's British spy as she recounts the details of a mission that sees her travel into Berlin in a search for the classic spy MacGuffin that is a list of double agents. In addition to fending off any enemy agents who would try to eliminate her, she also has to keep her wits about her when dealing with potential allies that she knows not to trust but still needs. The plot being rife with double-crosses and shifting loyalties definitely reflects the flaw that ultimately compromises Atomic Blonde - for a film that screams style over substance, it definitely wants to spend a significant amount of time on the substance. Though one can give the film points for granting Theron's ice queen a battered sense of humanity that anchors its convoluted plot, those same convolutions stretch the film out and loosen the pacing enough to affect its capacity for swift action beats (to say nothing of how they can and do lapse into some rather unfortunate clichés, especially when a physically versatile performer like Sofia Boutella is relegated to playing an exposition-dumping love interest).
There is something to be said for Atomic Blonde's spots of action, such as they are - Theron's definitely got the necessary physicality to convincingly shoot, stab, and punch her way from reel to reel. The problems stem from how she is utilised in various sequences that have trouble providing much in the way of innovation or even a compelling sense of style; one fistfight that takes place during a screening of Andrei Tarkovsky's Stalker is somehow less eye-catching than the images of apocalyptic stillness playing in the background. Even the film's most memorable set-piece, which has already come to be known simply as "the staircase scene", feels strangely inert and overly belaboured in trying to deliver a blistering long take; in many ways, it's a perfect demonstration of the core inconsistency that compromises Atomic Blonde as a whole. Every scene oscillates on a sliding scale between cool and cold, pulling in two opposed directions that are almost irreconcilable. Even so, I doubt that all its problems could be solved by committing solely to one of the two approaches, though given its lack of weighty material I'd personally prefer that it owned its coolness beyond splashing a few scenes in neon and piping in some era-appropriate tunes. A band like Ministry made music that is custom-built for brutal action yet here it's used for a simple scene transition (but what a transition it is). Atomic Blonde may want its audience to soak in its differing styles the way that its heroine will soak herself in a bathtub full of ice, but you can't soak in hot water and cold water at the same time. The result would feel very much like this film - lukewarm.
ATOMIC BLONDE
David Leitch, 2017
David Leitch, 2017
In the days leading up to the collapse of the Berlin Wall, an MI6 agent undertakes a mission to recover highly-sensitive material from within East Berlin.
Balancing style with substance is tough - constructing a deliberate imbalancing might actually be tougher. It certainly seems that way with Atomic Blonde, a solo feature from John Wick co-director David Leitch. It's certainly unapologetic about mixing and matching authentic 1980s aesthetics with 2010s retro-fetishistic exaggerations of the same, creating a world that goes from Cold War desaturation to New Wave decadence at the drop of a needle. This also applies to a plot that stumbles along the fine line between stark spy drama and lurid action thriller, following Charlize Theron's British spy as she recounts the details of a mission that sees her travel into Berlin in a search for the classic spy MacGuffin that is a list of double agents. In addition to fending off any enemy agents who would try to eliminate her, she also has to keep her wits about her when dealing with potential allies that she knows not to trust but still needs. The plot being rife with double-crosses and shifting loyalties definitely reflects the flaw that ultimately compromises Atomic Blonde - for a film that screams style over substance, it definitely wants to spend a significant amount of time on the substance. Though one can give the film points for granting Theron's ice queen a battered sense of humanity that anchors its convoluted plot, those same convolutions stretch the film out and loosen the pacing enough to affect its capacity for swift action beats (to say nothing of how they can and do lapse into some rather unfortunate clichés, especially when a physically versatile performer like Sofia Boutella is relegated to playing an exposition-dumping love interest).
There is something to be said for Atomic Blonde's spots of action, such as they are - Theron's definitely got the necessary physicality to convincingly shoot, stab, and punch her way from reel to reel. The problems stem from how she is utilised in various sequences that have trouble providing much in the way of innovation or even a compelling sense of style; one fistfight that takes place during a screening of Andrei Tarkovsky's Stalker is somehow less eye-catching than the images of apocalyptic stillness playing in the background. Even the film's most memorable set-piece, which has already come to be known simply as "the staircase scene", feels strangely inert and overly belaboured in trying to deliver a blistering long take; in many ways, it's a perfect demonstration of the core inconsistency that compromises Atomic Blonde as a whole. Every scene oscillates on a sliding scale between cool and cold, pulling in two opposed directions that are almost irreconcilable. Even so, I doubt that all its problems could be solved by committing solely to one of the two approaches, though given its lack of weighty material I'd personally prefer that it owned its coolness beyond splashing a few scenes in neon and piping in some era-appropriate tunes. A band like Ministry made music that is custom-built for brutal action yet here it's used for a simple scene transition (but what a transition it is). Atomic Blonde may want its audience to soak in its differing styles the way that its heroine will soak herself in a bathtub full of ice, but you can't soak in hot water and cold water at the same time. The result would feel very much like this film - lukewarm.