Red Sparrow

At least the movie didn't suck this time. It highly disturbed me but didn't piss me off.

The first thing I gotta tell you guys is, all the reviews I have read have panned this movie and is pure smut, just sexploitation splashed on the screen with a subpar story. This is a lie. These are probably the same people who deem Eyes Wide Shut as just artsy porn, there is more to it. Okay so story goes, a young woman who is the star of the Moscow ballet is injured and roped into this bizzare government facility that basically goes full Salo on these people, effectively transforming them into pure physical assets of the state to be used promisculously to gain information from selected targets through any means necessary. This is a hard movie to sit through. The almost brainwashing of individuals as Jennifer Lawrence's character puts it "whore school" is incredibly hard to watch. I am not a prude or against sex, but their are limts to that kind of thing! Like every sex scene save one is incredibly uncomfortable and made me want to jump into a scalding hot bath to get the filth off me, but it's there for a reason. This is the story of a girl who is broken literally and metaphorically and is trying to find a way out of such a horrid lifestyle. The story is not a byproduct of the sex, the sex takes a backseat to the story. After the horrid I guess "boot camp" the movie goes into double-triple crosses, backstabbing, and many tropes of the spy genre which does a engaging and great job. The film challenges people on the concepts of choice, sacrifice, and commitment to people or a cause and it does a good job. This is an engaging story that you want to know how it all ends. It's funny, I lost my damn mind at the sex scene in Atomic Blonde but at least that was consensual and looked like they were having a good time! Jesus Christ, Russia I have to say this, if such a thing still occurs in your country you gotta stop that immediately, you are better than this. Though the movie has elements of different movies like I said, Salo, Atomic Blonde which thusly leads to the James Bond series, how people compare the use of sex like in Eyes Wide Shut (even though they are idiots), it still has it's own identity and is it's own movie. Can I recommend it to everybody? Oh hell no! Can I say it was a good movie that did a very good job telling a story with great but subdued performances, excellent subtext and allegory to concepts held dear to many people, and has an interesting but heavily disturbing plot? Oh hell yeah! But you need to prepare yourself for the darker moments. It did not offend, but it certainly did disturb. And now I need to bleach my brain....