Charlize Theron kills it as sleek assassin in action-packed 'Atomic Blonde'
"Atomic Blonde" may be confusing, empty and disappointing, but when sleek and sinewy British MI6 agent Lorraine Broughton goes DEFCON-1 on the bad guys, boredom dies first.
Check out the four-star action set piece in the middle of this otherwise clunky and complicated spy thriller.
Broughton, played by a ripped and raging Charlize Theron, takes on a gang of assassins in a Berlin apartment building.
A brilliantly choreographed ballet of seemingly spontaneous violence unfolds with Broughton savagely shooting, stabbing, smacking, kicking, punching, choking and corkscrewing her aggressors in a breathless, exhausting commitment to survival.
This phenomenal segment, captured in fluid camera movements revealing no apparent edits (take that, Jason Bourne!), extends to the streets where a frenetic car chase concludes with a crash into a river, a truly immersive, claustrophobic experience.
Inspired by Antony Johnston's graphic novel "The Coldest City," "Atomic Blonde" begins in 1989 Germany, just before the fall of the Berlin Wall.
Theron's horribly bruised and damaged agent lies naked in a bathtub filled with ice, almost luxuriating in the coldness. Steel-blue light bathes the scene with the same icy frigidity that Broughton emanates when on the job.
Broughton goes before her MI6 superior Eric Gray (Toby Jones) and gruff CIA chief Emmett Kurzfeld (John Goodman) for debriefing. They want her to explain everything that occurred following the killing of her secret lover, James Gasciogne (Sam Hargrave), a dedicated MI6 agent who uses his last words to pass on important expository information identifying who he and his Russian killer are.
A wristwatch containing names of British agents has disappeared. Broughton must locate it and protect a defecting Russian agent code-named Spyglass (Eddie Marsan). He has locked the names in his photographic memory.
Broughton reluctantly seeks assistance from MI6's Berlin contact David Percival (James McAvoy), a scruffy guy who's gone native by selling whiskey and designer clothing on Germany's black market.
Toss in some vague villains and phony-looking digital blood spray and you've got the ultraviolent, ultra-stylized "Atomic Blonde."
Former stuntman David Leitch directs "Atomic Blonde" with the same visual panache and energetic verve he plied to both "John Wick" movies. (There's a reason Broughton takes after Wick more than James Bond.)
The screenplay by Kurt Johnstad is at best journalistically sloppy. Most of the story comes from Broughton's testimony about what she did, saw and heard. How does she know what other people - some of whom she's never met - said and did in other places? Neither Gray nor Kurzfeld ever challenges her.
This is just a movie, of course, one in which loud 1980s pop tunes often prop up the narrative, sometimes to distraction.
The South Africa-born Theron bumps up her action experiences from "Aeon Flux" and "Mad Max Fury Road" to soaring heights here, earning her action star status alongside Hollywood titans Linda Hamilton, Sigourney Weaver and Michelle Rodriguez.
"I chose this life," Broughton says, "and some day it's going to get me killed."
But not in this movie. She's so cold, she's hot.
“Atomic Blonde”
★ ★ ½
Starring: Charlize Theron, James McAvoy, John Goodman, Sofia Boutella, Til Schweiger
Directed by: David Leitch
Other: A Focus Features release. Rated R for language, nudity, sexual situations, violence. 115 minutes