Thursday, November 14, 2019

(2019) Charlie's Angels - A Fresher Look at the Famous and Iconic Characters from the 70s-80s TV Series

I did not realize that they were making a new Charlie's Angels movie until I saw the trailer few weeks ago. Since my wife and I are fans of adventure comedy movies and after seeing the trailer few times, we thought the movie looked interesting so we did not hesitate to buy the tickets during the advance sale event last week. Too bad it did not play in my favorite Atmos theater last night and we had to settle for a cinema with the standard Dolby system. OK, enough of that and let's get into the movie.

Brief Story Line

Sabina (Kristen Stewart - The Twilight movies, Panic Room etc) and Jane (Ella Balinska) were two angels who were assigned by Charlie to protect Elena (Naomi Scott - Aladdin live version, Terra Nova TV series etc) who had created something that might endanger the world if fallen into the wrong hands. Elena was trying to report to the company's owner Brock (Sam Claflin - AdriftSnow White and the Huntsman etc) on the problem and also fix her creation. 


However it was becoming especially difficult when a dangerous assassin (Jonathan Tucker - Hostage, Kingdom TV series etc) tried to assassinate her. With the support from the new Bosley (Elizabeth Banks - BrightburnPower Rangers 2017 movie etc), the angels tried their best to save Elena and at the same time find out the real culprit behind the assassin.

So what would happen to the Angels? Find them all in this adventure comedy movie.

End of Brief Story Line

To be honest, my wife and I had a bit of a doubt when seeing one of the name as the angel as we were not really fan of her. But we wanted to give the movie a chance. And to our delight, she did not really disappoint and we thought her characterization was quite good and provided us with some good laughs. My wife pointed out that she felt like the character played by Drew Barrymore in the previous Charlie's Angels movies. Well the rest of the angels were OK as well like Jane who was played by an actress that I had never seen before. And last but not least Naomi Scott who played the character of the idealist and rather naive Elena.

This movie had some surprising twists which I probably should have done better in identifying but it came out quite nice and interesting for us as we were kept at a guessing game till almost the end. I also like the way the story was written to explain the more than one Bosley in the Townsend Agency since the TV series period and the two previous movies. For those who are unaware, this movie was based on the very famous series in the mid 70s to early 80s. It was also shown in the only Indonesian TV channel then (in the early 80s) where I remembered watching it every week. In the year 2000 and 2003 there were 2 movies released with obviously new characters played by Cameron Diaz, Drew Barrymore and Lucy Liu. And this 2019 movie is supposed to be the sequel to those movies as could be seen from the references made in here.

As an action comedy movie, this one was quite OK in combining the two elements. The actions might not be the high octane and spectacular type but adequately done, while the comedy side were shown a bit here and there, though they were not really hilarious which could make you laugh out loud a lot. There was no real emotional moments for audience here, despite having one or two supposedly touching scenes. The main plot itself was probably a bit weak and a bit confusing with the multiple twists but for us it was just for fun and we did not really take them too seriously.

In addition to those characters above, there were also other names like Patrick Stewart, Djimon Hounsou, Chris Pang and few others who provided supporting roles. And the film had some well known female names as cameos too such as former UFC champion and martial artist Ronda Rousey, famous race car driver Danica Patrick, actress Laverne Cox and other actresses with one person in particular that my wife was delighted to see. Btw this one surprisingly had 118 minutes duration including the closing credits which had numerous brief mid end credit scenes but no post end credit scene.

Overall I thought this one was not bad as action comedy movie. It has few brief comedic moments with some good enough actions plus some surprising twists. It was quite a fun and very light movie to enjoy without overthinking about the rather weak plot. Although if we had to compare with the previous Charlie's Angels movies, this one might not be better in term of quality but it did feel fresh for the current condition. So if you just want to have some fun and see some nice enough actions or you just want to walk down memory lane to see the new Charlie's Angels, then this one should be interesting enough for you. But do not expect this to be high quality action or action comedy movie.

Mike's movie moments rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars 

1 comment:

  1. A remake of the classic action adventure detective espionage melodrama TV series based from the TV show of the same title released in 2019 with a new characters new attitude new setting and a new look for the new millenium of the next generation of female characters.

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