Movie Review: Atomic Blonde (2017)

Title: Atomic Blonde
Year: 2017
Duration: 115 min.
Country: United States
Directed by: David Leitch
With: Charlize Theron, James McAvoy, Eddie Marsan, John Goodman, Toby Jones, James Faulkner, Roland Møller, Sofia Boutella, Bill Skarsgård, Sam Hargrave, Til Schweiger.
Grade: 7

This past weekend I was watching a few movies, and among them a good spy movie called Atomic Blonde (2017). To tell you the truth, I had been postponing it because I was afraid it would be a non-stop slop, but it wasn't like that.

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Atomic Blonde is the typical twisted espionage story, in the style of John Le Carré novels, although seasoned with John Wick-style action scenes. There are similarities to the Bourne (film) series, and lots of (huge) differences to the Bond series, which give us clues as to what's really going on and where the protagonist is on the board. My first thought was: "Whoops, movie with zero originality." Well no, the similarities are only in form. And to top it off, the movie is entertaining. (If I tell you that it is directed by one of the directors of John Wick (2014), you can already see where it is going.)

The story takes place in 1989, in the very few days before the collapse of the Berlin Wall. The action begins with the death of an MI6 agent in Berlin and the loss of a list with the names of all the counter-intelligence operatives who customarily operate in the area. And there, the British send Lorraine Broughton (Charlize Theron), to see if she recovers the list without being tampered with and to unmask a dangerous triple agent.

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It's a mission with an expiration date, since as soon as the Wall falls, all that will be meaningless. Even so, Lorraine takes the plane to Berlin and as soon as she arrives, she is intercepted by a couple of KGB agents who impersonate the real MI6 agents, that is, the poor girl has already been exposed, despite the fact that she doesn't go around revealing her true identity as a certain James Bond guy with a license to kill usually does. Well, that's how it went in his last film.

From then on, we find ourselves with a plot that is a bit complicated, but that can be followed if one does not take our eyes off the screen, which is not very difficult, since there are enough action scenes to keep us entertained. Of course, I recommend seeing it at least twice, since in the second pass some details are better appreciated and we end up understanding why so-and-so does this or so-and-so does this. (Also, the action scenes are worth a second look.)

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The film alternates between the present, in which Lorraine is accountable to her superiors (Toby Jones and John Goodman), and the recent past, in which her mission or missions unfold. All in a very eighties environment, with musical themes and allusions that will make more than one nostalgic person sigh. Also, although the protagonist is female and bisexual, this doesn't get in the way of the narrative or feels forced and everything flows naturally, which is a rarity these days.

And an interesting detail: Atomic Blonde is based (in part) on a graphic novel written by Antony Johnston (note, not "Anthony" but Antony), and drawn by Sam Hart called The Coldest City. Although in this movie we can appreciate the usual beauty of Charlize Theron, as the plot progresses, poor Lorraine is getting more and more beaten. To say that they beat her to a pulp is an understatement, but at least the others get the worst of it in this recommendable orgy of graphic violence.