Red Sparrow (2018) Review

When ballerina Dominika Egorova is brutally injured her strange Uncle gives her only one choice, become a Sparrow as part of the Russian intelligence service and train to use her body as a weapon. Her first mission is to target the CIA agent who is a big threat with his Russian insider.

⭐️

Having seen the trailers and heard a little about this film that little bit really being Jennifer Lawerence is a Russian spy. I had no idea about the ballerina start and that was certainly a nice surprise. That however was the only part that I can say was a surprise in a good and nice way, everything else seemed to be in place more for shocks than any thing else and I found myself rather bored during the almost 2 hour and 20 minutes we are given. It honestly did not have to be that long at all.

Firstly I feel as though I need to talk about just how incredible the cast of this film really are, Oscar winners and Oscar nominees all lending themself to this film with pretty poor Russian accents which seemed very strong to begin with and then drifted in and out hearing that some are actually American and some British. For a few seconds I thought I had made the same mistake before the Death of Stallin although they didn’t even bother with the accents . . . Anyway that was the main standout thing that annoyed me throughout the film. I guess it was also a strange time to see something about Russian spies considering the event which happened over the weekend with a former spy being posioned in England. I do not imagine this film will even get a release in Russia? (Just checked it it is in place for 31st March).

I am such a fan of Jennifer Lawerence but afraid that she is not making good choices at the moment. I guess it was also going to be difficult winning an Oscar so young and having a huge franchise as well. But someone please help her out a little bit more. I really don’t think her full nudity was worth it for a film of this nature. Especially the way it was in that crazy Sparrow School which was a very strange sex ed class with Charlotte Rampling. Again with the nature of sexual harassment and assault being such a talking point recently a lot of these scenes are not good at all. Encourage the recruits to do anything they need to in order to protect their country. Not good messages at all!

The thing is though without certain parts like those crazy sex parts, it could have been a pretty decent film. I do enjoy Joel Edgerton who has had a very good career recently but this film was just way too creepy and all fully based around sex. Surely there’s a lot more to being a spy than seducing and having sex with someone? Well we would certainly hope so. I am going to try and stay positive to that the twist at the end was ok. Although I kinda guessed wrong, but I wasn’t fully bothered about the film anyway, such a shame.