Theron all kinds of smokin’ in fun, stylish ‘Atomic Blonde’
In the stylish and violent new spy thriller “Atomic Blonde,” Charlize Theron has three jobs: look incredibly sexy, kick copious amounts of butt and smoke constantly.
She does all three extremely well — often twice at the same time — and is the biggest of several reasons “Atomic Blonde” works very well and is entertaining. (But, seriously, the smoking — to be safe, a drinking game for this movie would need to be built around moments when Theron ISN’T puffing on a cigarette.)
The next-most-important person to “Atomic Blonde” working as well as it does is director David Leitch, a co-director of acclaimed 2014 action buffett “John Wick.” “Atomic Blonde” doesn’t feel quite as silly as “John Wick” can at times — it comes close — but it does bring a lot of similarly high-quality action scenes, Theron succeeding in pain-delivery department just as Keanu Reeves did in “Wick.”
The tone of “Atomic Blonde” is set in its opening scene, set on a snowy night in Berlin in 1989, not long before the fall of the Berlin Wall and the end of the Cold War. A man on the street is slammed into by a car, which sends him smashing into the back of a parked van. The driver of the car gets out of his vehicle, exchanges a few words with his victim, shoots him and tosses him into the river.
As we hear the sound of the body hit the water, Leitch cuts to Theron’s MI6 Agent Lorraine Broughton emerging from a tub of icy water. It is 10 days later, we learn, and her body is beaten and battered. She fixes herself a vodka rocks and gazes at a photograph of her and the man we’ve just seen die, a snapshot she then burns.
We soon see her being debriefed at an MI6 outpost by a superior, Toby Jones’ Eric Gray, and CIA operative Emmett Kurzfeld, portrayed by John Goodman — wearing a whole lot of beard. She doesn’t seem happy to be there and especially unhappy to be in the presence of the American agent.
Nonetheless, she walks them — and us — through the events of the previous days, in which she was paired with embedded station chief David Percival (James McAvoy) to try to recover a highly sensitive document, a list of the identities and personal details of all Western agents operating in Berlin.
Throughout a series of flashbacks, Percival slides from seemingly trustworthy to less so. However, it’s hard to know what to make of almost any character in a good spy movie, and “Atomic Blonde” is no different. Can Lorraine trust beautiful, inexperienced French agent Delphine Lasalle (Sofia Boutella) with whom she becomes, well, very close?
Part of the job for Lorraine becomes keeping alive a man called Spyglass (Eddie Marsan), who has committed the aforementioned list to memory and must be escorted to safety. That will not be easy in the crowded, tension-filled streets of Berlin.
And is Lorraine even a reliable narrator? Almost surely not completely.
“Atomic Blonde” is not without its faults. Most notably, the screenplay by Kurt Johnstad (“300”), based on graphic novel series “The Coldest City” by Antony Johnston and Sam Hart, can be hard to follow. You could argue at times the story borders on nonsensical.
Less importantly, while the film mostly effectively uses 1980s pop-rock — “Under Pressure” by Queen and David Bowie really lifts a scene — it sometimes just can’t help itself from being insanely on the nose. When Lorraine doesn’t want Delphine and herself to be picked up by possible recording devices, she turns up a radio that happens to be playing ‘Til Tuesday’s “Voices Carry,” and when she and Spyglass are being chased, we are treated to Flock of Seagulls “I Ran (So Far Away).” On the other hand, it’s hard to explain the use of George Michael’s “Father Figure” and Lorraine beats the
tar out of a few fellas in a kitchen.
In a nice contrast, the movie’s central fight scene — in which Lorraine exchanges punches, stabs and gunshots with multiple assailants in a stairwell and then in an apartment unit — is made more visceral because Leitch eschews the use of music here. We are left with the dramatic sounds of the violence, accented by excellent camerawork and editing that recalls, if only slightly, what director Alejandro G. Iñárritu did with his 2014 Oscar winner “Birdman.”
Leitch’s name can’t be spoken in the same breathe as that filmmaker’s yet, but his work in “Atomic Blonde” is pretty impressive. If nothing else, it should excite “Deadpool” fans that he has been tapped to helm “Deadpool 2.”
With its sense of fashion — Lorraine’s outfits are killer — and slick camera work, “Atomic Blonde” is the most stylish movie since, well, the recently released and terrific “Baby Driver.” In fact, were “Baby Driver” still not so fresh in our minds, the use of music in “Atomic Blonde” might seem a whole lot cooler, baby.
Ah, but “Baby Driver” — with apologies to Ansel Elgort — doesn’t have the same level heavyweight lead. Theron (“Mad Max: Fury Road,” “The Fate of the Furious”) is entirely captivating, infusing this nuclear woman with smarts and strengths to go along with those looks.
And while less key to powering “Atomic Blonde,” McAvoy follow’s his fine work in last year’s M. Night Shyamalan film “Split” with a nice effort here. His Percival is enough of a wild card to keep things interesting.
And “Atomic Blonde” is interesting right to the end.
You may not entirely understand every twist and turn that got you there, but you’ll should enjoy the ride.