If the violent fight scenes in Atomic Blonde look a bit familiar, the director of Atomic Blonde, David Leitch, was the stunt coorderinator of the John Wick movies. Charlize Theron plays a beautiful (but deadly) MI6 operative. The McGuffin in this movie is a “list” of agents hidden in a wrist watch which the KGB, MI6, and the CIA all lust after. James McAvoy is the hyper MI6 section chief in 1989 Berlin. Sofia Boutelia–who starred in the ill-fated The Mummy–is a French agent. Toby Jones and John Goodman mostly glower. The plot is murky. The positive aspect of this movie is that Charlize Theron is on the screen a lot. But she takes a lot of punishment. This is another comic adaptation, based on The Coldest City, a 180-page graphic novel written by Antony Johnston, drawn by Sam Hart, and published in 2012 by Oni Press; a prequel, Dead of Winter, came out last year with art by Steven Perkins. GRADE: B
TRACK LIST:
1. Cat People (Putting Out the Fire) – David Bowie
2. Major Tom (Völlig Losgelöst) – Peter Schilling
3. Blue Monday – Health
4. C*Cks*Cker – Tyler Bates
5. 99 Luftballons – Nena
6. Father Figure – George Michael
7. Der Commissar – After the Fire
8. Cities in Dust – Siouxsie and the Banshees
9. The Politics of Dancing – Re-Flex
10. Stigmata – Marilyn Manson & Tyler Bates
11. Demonstration – Tyler Bates
12. I Ran (So Far Away) – A Flock of Seagulls
13. 99 Luftballons – Kaleida
14. Voices Carry – Til Tuesday
15. London Calling – The Clash
16. Finding the Uhf Device – Tyler Bates
ADDITIONAL MUSIC IN THE MOVIE NOT INCLUDED ON THE SOUNDTRACK:
1. Blue Monday ’88 – New Order
2. Fight The Power – Public Enemy
3. Kack Zukunft – Ausschlag
4. Der Kommissar – After The Fire
5. As Time Goes By – Michael Parnell
6. Behind the Wheel – Depeche Mode
7. Tetris Theme
8. Drinking Song – Alfred Gluten
9. MTV News Theme – Thomas A.C. Weiser and Perry Geyer
10. Fastidious Horses – Vladimir Vysotsky
11. Under Pressure – Queen and David Bowie
I heard she gets nekkid.
Bob, your information sources are correct.
Our paper gave this 2 1/2 stars. I’ll see it on Netflix. Theron and McAvoy are the big draws for me (He’s a favorite on the Graham Norton show – so funny).
OT: Graham Norton has written a mystery. It’s on Mount TBR.
Maggie, ATOMIC BLONDE is being marketed as a “female James Bond” movie. ATOMIC BLONDE has none of the wit and humor of the Bond flicks.
The trailers turned me off completely. Tired of ulta-violent movies unless it’s a true story like DUNKIRK. And I like the stars too. Too bad. DETROIT for me tonight. Hope I can take it.
Patti, I’m on the bubble with DETRIOT. Your review will tip the balance.
I passed along to Patti a very dissatisfied review of DETROIT from a reviewer for Ebert’s site, where the reviewer felt the film was tone-deaf and insensitive…perhaps, given what you say here about AB, it’s a trend…
Todd, I’ve read a couple lukewarm reviews of DETROIT. I don’t plan to see it unless someone I know raves about DETROIT.
I saw the [incredibly loud] preview of this when we saw WONDER WOMAN this week. I’ll wait for JOHN WICK III. I find McEvoy can be overly smirky at times.
DETROIT got kind of a mediocre review in the NY Times. Again, I lived through those times (I remember reading THE ALGIERS MOTEL INCIDENT) and don’t need to relive them. I’d rather see the new PLANET OF THE APES movie.
Jeff, I probably won’t see DETROIT unless Patti Abbott says it’s worth seeing.
I remember the riots. I was 19 then. I was in Detriot that night to see Tim Buckley at the Grande Ballroom. Luckily the riots didn’t start to 4 or 5 in the morning and I was home by then. The movie has been getting a lot of publicity here because of
it’s subject matter.
Have Atomic Blonde on my list which also includes the new Planet of the Apes, Big Sick and Spider-Man.
Steve, you have a bunch of entertaining movies ahead of you. I liked THE BIG SICK and SPIDER MAN a lot.
Atomic blonde? How rad!
Comic-book movie set in the Cold War…natch!
Jerry, ATOMIC BLONDE is a kick-butt movie.
Did anyone count the number of people killed in the movie?
If that were the same in real life the secret services would need hundreds (or even thousands …) of new recruits every year!
I hope that they have at least nice pictures from Berlin …
PS:
Somehow the story reminds me of what’s going on in Trump’s team right now – though there atleast the people aren’t killed, just thrown out … 🙂
Wolf, like the JOHN WICK movies, the body count in ATOMIC BLONDE was pretty high.
As I recall, the Detroit riots happened when I was at sea on a troop ship headed for Nam. They told me there was a small riot on the ship because of it, but I didn’t see any fighting myself.
Bob, I remember rioting in several U.S. cities around that time. It wasn’t just Detroit.