BirdsOfPrey finally gives Margot Robbie's Harley Quinn the spotlight—and her own aggressively mediocre movie. Read Peter Travers' review
remake wished it could be. Independence looks good on Harley, but she needs to put together a formidable crew to take on old enemies who want to kill her now that the Joker isn’t around to provide protection and immunity. These women, her birds, are her best allies in taking on a testosterone contingent of second-tier villains, led byas a Gotham City slimbeball named Roman Sisonis, aka Black Mask.
The fun comes in watching the women kick ass. Jurnee Smollett-Bell does just that as Dinah Lance, aka Black Canary, a songbird in Roman’s nightclub who’s become a street fighter to deflect male aggression. Mary Elizabeth Winstead excels as Huntress, aka the cross-bow killer, who’s taken a vow of vengeance against the gangsters who killed her family right in front of her. She’s pissed.
The excuse for a plot involves another woman: Cassandra Cain , a teen thief who’s stolen a kajillion-dollar diamond that Roman covets. Since Cassandra has swallowed the jewel, Roman and his henchmen want to cut it out of her. The ladies favor a more conventional bowel movement. Make your own guesses about the jokes that follow from there.so there’s plenty of gore. But Harley shoots paint, bean bags and glitter out of her gun, and seems impervious to injury.
The fight scenes grow numbing as the birds take on the goons in melees that add up mostly to noise. All you feel is numb as Yan piles on one brawl after another to give the illusion that something is happening. Nothing really is.whatever its shortcomings, tackled a festering society that created its own monsters. Slapping the topical theme of female empowerment on a story that trucks in business-as-usual violence does not qualify as a game-changer — or a reason to go to the movies.
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