Out for revenge

Colombiana (2011)
Certified: 16
Duration: 108 minutes
Directed by: Olivier Megaton
Starring: Zoe Saldana, Amandla Stenberg, Michael Vartan, Cliff Curtis, Lennie James, Callum Blue, Jordi Mollà, Graham McTavish, Max Martini
KRS release

Produced by Luc Besson and directed by Oliver Megaton, the film is a case of the protégé trying to emulate the master. This film is in the same vein as Mr Besson’s Leon (1994), one of the best films of the 1990s. The result is stylish, full of slow motion sequences and de rigueur shootouts but it lacks spirit, character and, most of all, identity.

Cataleya (Amanda Stenberg) was just four years old when her parents were murdered by Don Luis’s (Beto Benites) criminal underlings. Marco (Jordi Molla) was given the orders to bring her to him as she had knowledge of the whereabouts of a microchip. This chip contained information that her dad had compiled about Don Luis that could put him in trouble with the law. Cataleya manages to escape, enter the United States and then disappears like she has never existed.

In the US, she ends up living with her Uncle Emilio (Cliff Curtis) in Chicago. Under his tutelage she learns how to become the best hired assassin in the business.

The film goes forward 15 years. A grown-up Cataleya (Zoe Saldana) is on a killing spree to flush Don Luis out. This is especially difficult since he has now been placed under CIA custody. Cataleya has a sort of relationship developing with artist Danny (Michael Vartan) who does not know what she does for a living. Meanwhile, the FBI led by agent Ross (Lennie James), is also hot on her heels.

Zoe Saldana is one of the recent crop of actresses who besides being dead stunning also has some acting talent to show off.

Here she is sexy, very athletic and shoots like no other. Seeing her chop down all the greasy scumbags, crawl through ventilation systems and jump over fences, play drunk and blast all the film’s props to smithereens is amusing. This soon wears thin when she is given no character to build, no realistic plot to follow and no tangible lines to say. Cool for coolness sake is difficult to achieve and here it eludes the actress but the fault is not hers.

At times the way she disappears all over the place and wriggles in and out of tight places makes her look like she is playing a female version of the great Houdini.

Colombiana as a whole is a mish-mash of every cliché of the genre and sports one predictable scene after another. A love affair with a painter played by Michael Vartan is added for no reason other than to show that the girl is made of flesh and blood.

It, however, reeks of just filler for a plot hole that the scriptwriters discovered after the hundredth shootout had been inserted.

The film lacks a decent, scene-stealing villain and the girl-turned-relentless killer is too cold and calculating from the start of the film to really elicit all that much sympathy for her.

Sporting a ludicrous plot, overdone panache and plenty of hyper kinetic thrills, this is not the Zoe Saldana action fest we had been promised.