Friday, November 22, 2019

Charlie's Angels (2019): The Good, The Bad and The Bosley


There are certain "disclosures" I should make before getting deep into this film review. First and foremost, I have an affinity for "spy films," not to be confused with whatever the Mission Impossible Franchise has currently become. Spy films have mystery, gadgets, charismatic characters, and high stakes goals. They are sleek with just the right dose of sexy. They remind you that around every corner, something exciting can await you. By the looks of it, society was ready for a reboot of Charlie's Angels. Feminism has made leaps and bounds since the original 1970s series (which I have admittedly haven't watched yet, again full disclosure), and even the two entries from the early 2000s were pre-MeToo era cinematic ventures. The last few years have indeed belonged to strong, fearless women, especially in Hollywood. With a successful woman at the helm of this specific project (Elizabeth Banks, wrote, produced, directed, and co-starred in the project), it seemed like a no-brainer for the new Charlie's Angels (2019) to be a sure-fire blockbuster hit. As this past weekend's dismal returns point out, it was anything but. The film is dead on arrival, a shame since a sequel would have likely improved the flaws present. Everyone seems to be obsessed with evaluating why Charlie's Angels failed at a time when bad-ass women doing bad-ass things on the big screen should be in high demand. I believe it is a combination of many different factors being presented by many different sides, including by Banks herself.

The film has the look of a summer blockbuster and yet was released in the middle of November for no discernible reason. Its marketing campaign, which includes a disappointing, stitched together theme song, was poorly constructed and executed with little to no gusto by Sony Pictures. It relies on the star-power of only one of its three female leads, and that star herself has been mostly absent from mainstream commercial films for several years. Make no mistake, Kristen Stewart is a breath of fresh air in this film. However, she still doesn't possess enough of the necessary charisma and genuine appeal on her own that Drew Barrymore, Lucy-Lui, and Cameron Diaz were able to delve out in spades as a buoyant trio. The other two stars, Ella Balinska and Naomi Scott, are competent, both in terms of acting talents and combat capabilities, but neither can produce meaningful on-screen chemistry with Stewart until the final few minutes of the film. By that, I mean during the end credits sequences!

Bank's bet too much on nostalgia, in terms of the IP and in the casting choices. While Charlie's Angels was a massive success in the '70s and '80s, audiences eventually dwindled as they found the premise increasingly tiring and sexist. The reboot in the 2000s brought some sparks of life back into the franchise. Still, it couldn't convince global audiences definitively that women receiving commands from a mysterious man on a voice box were a healthy profession. The latter wanted to kick butt and take names on their terms, not someone else's. In terms of casting, these days, we are happy to see Patrick Stewart do something other than giving soliloquies from a wheelchair. Still, that doesn't mean casting him against-type is going to prove successful or even mildly believable to a wide audience accustomed to seeing him as an endearing and gentle prophet. The other two Angel films have such memorable; albeit camp-filled performances from their heroes and villains alike, this film can't conclusively find its footing tone-wise in order for the actors to produce the same entertaining results. Balinska's character Jane, a former MI6 Agent, fares the worst of the three lead actresses. Her character is supposed to be a type-A, no-nonsense personality who has just gone through a serious loss. Yet she shamelessly flirts with a young and handsome research assistant (played by a wasted Noah Centineo) while in the middle of a mission to avenge the very person she lost. It makes no sense in terms of character arc and makes the character appear inconsistent and needlessly vampy. Many of the intentionally comedic moments fall flat or produce minor chuckles when they are clearly meant to be seam-splitting moments of hilarity, and they are coupled with fight scenes that often end unnecessarily violent. While the film doesn't sport much visible blood-shed per se, it certainly contains a sizable body count. Bank's script thinks that topical references to things like Ben Affleck's portrayal of Batman will give her work relevancy, but all it will do is likely badly date the film's dialogue in the years to come. The film concludes with a seemingly feminist twist. A woman (I will not name her here) is behind Charlie's voice box now since he has since passed away (RIP John Forsythe, whom this film should have been dedicated to), but this revelation lacks logic and context. Why is this woman still using Charlie's voice rather than her own? Why should we be proud of the idea of a woman co-opting the male persona in order to achieve dominance, perhaps because that is actually what men have been doing for years behind the scenes with the Angels themselves? They bellow about female independence while forcing these women into skimpy disguises to solve problems in the world that men have mostly started. It's muddy waters that Bank's script shows no interest in exploring, which is again why it is likely saved as a last-minute throwaway during the end credits.

Again comparisons to the film's failures can be easily made to its ho-hum theme song "Don't Call Me Angel." The song was advertised as a once in a lifetime collaboration between three megastars of the pop world. The song is really just three different singer's separate recording sessions sewn together without any account for style or consistent tone. This film throws a lot at the wall hoping it will stick, and some of it does quite well, but not enough to warrant its existence in a time when old IP is being revived faster than an Angel gets its wings in the Heavens above.

All of this set-aside, the film was extremely fun to watch. If it didn't have a legacy to live up to, it likely would have fared far better with critics and audiences alike. It's action sequences are aplenty and feel well ingrained in the narrative rather than obligatory, and the cast seems to be having a genuinely good time exchanging puns and kicking ass. The film struggles to balance its comedic and dramatic elements into a harmonious whole. The comedy at times feels forced, basically when anyone but Stewart makes a joke, and the drama isn't given a chance to be adequately explored by its cast. Every time the film is close to showing genuine emotion, it sugarcoats it with a glossy aesthetic and off-time comic relief. We don't see a meaningful arc built throughout the film in which these three women learn to trust one another and become a real team. That is a shame because the fact that they are new to working together is one of the biggest differences between this film and the previous two. It does some interesting things in terms of elaborating on the existing mythology of the Townsend Agency, expanding it to an international scale, and clearly advocates for diversity as seen by the numerous women of color present in the film as background Angels and their allies. Still, the film feels mostly driven by the same white feminist perspective that has always dominated Charlie's Angels. It is about beautiful women using their beauty to undermine dastardly men. At the end of the day, this premise is just too dated for a majority of audience members, even if its rebranded somewhat and given a pro-feminist spin. Bank's gave it her all to try and provide a fresh spin on this franchise. Still, several poor filmmaking choices, coupled with other contributing factors working against her success, led to this failure. These factors include a studio that felt as indifferent to the product they were supposed to be trying to sell as audiences who were supposed to want to see it. This has led me to believe that this is the final time we will get to see the Angels fly for quite some time.