GUNPOWDER MILKSHAKE (15)
★★★II
Former Doctor Who star Karen Gillan has forged quite the Hollywood career as an action woman in films like Guardians of the Galaxy and Jumanji.
She parades her fighting skills again in Gunpowder Milkshake as the daughter of Scarlet, (Lena Headey) an assassin for a shadowy syndicate called The Firm. When she leaves town in a hurry, Sam (Gillan) takes up the murderous mantle under mentor Nathan (Paul Giamatti).
He despatches Scarlet to terminate “an accountant” but she inadvertently murders the son of crime lord Jim McAlester (Ralph Ineson) then disobeys orders to use The Firm’s cash as ransom money for the dead accountant’s eight-year-old daughter, Emily (Chloe Coleman).
Nathan has no choice but to issue a kill order against Scarlet. She seeks sanctuary with three librarians – Anna May (Angela Bassett), Florence (Michelle Yeoh) and Madeleine (Carla Gugino) – who hide weapons inside classic novels.
Gunpowder Milkshake is an explosive and fitfully entertaining melee that puts John Wick and Kill Bill in a blender. Body counts are high but emotionally satisfying thrills are in shorter supply.
In selected cinemas and on Sky Cinema from Friday