Blackk WidowNot a bad movie. Based on the Marvel character "Black Widow" played by Scarlett Johansson and Florence Pugh and Rachel Weisz. Ergo, we are lead to believe that the Black Widow is a job title and not an alias of female assassins trained in Russian versions of S.H.I.E.L.D.
We start off with a slow introduction of Natasha Romanoff (Ever Anderson) and Yelena Belova (Violet McGraw) as children with their surrogate mother in the midst of fleeing an arrest for their surrogate father's, Alexei's, torching of a government building (S.H.I.E.L.D.) and stealing a disk file (S.H.I.E.L.D. intel) and fleeing Cuba. As they get to the airfield, Alexei holds off a few police vehicles that have caught up with the 'family', with the use of a rifle and Alexei's own brute (superhuman) strength. Alexei manages to jump on the wing of the small plane as the rest of the family fly off to safety. Whilst the mother, Melina, is suffering from gunshot wounds during take off, Natasha has to take off the plane for her. This is actually a good action scene.
In Cuba, the medics attend Melina, whilst Alexei talks with the head of his organisation, General Dreykov. It is revealed that Alexei is an undercover spy living in Ohio for the 3 years prior. Romanoff and Belova are put in the "Red Room" for training to become Black Widows. The movie then cuts to 2016 to the era when Romanoff is on the run from General Ross, after Romanoff having betrayed the King of Wakanda in the "Captain America: Civil War" movie.
For the first hour, the movie gets bogged down with Romanoff having to track down her sister. Whilst her sister gets caught up escaping her own mind-controlled existence as a Black Widow when she retrieves virals of an antidote that can free other Widows of their mind control. With the help of a safe house keeper, Romanoff and Belova track down their 'father', Alexei, who is in prison for some reason (allegedly to do with suppressing the truth about his existence). The prison escape is one of the most over the top action scenes in Marvel history. At one point, a rocket propelled grenade explosion was enough to trigger a nearby avalanche from the mountains towards the prison. That aided the escapees, as the prison guards had to run for cover back in the prison. Go figure.
The helicopter they use in the escape manages to crash land not far from Melina's hideout. Melina welcomes the three with open arms and updates the team with no real consideration about the gravity of what they have been through. Later that night, there seems to be a double-cross and Natasha and Yelena are taken to General Dreykov's headquarters. But, the doublecross is a deception for the sake of gaining access to General Dreykov. Yelena makes a brave escape. Natasha has trouble trying to kill Dreykov. And Alexei and Melina escape their own imprisonment. After Natasha's failure to kill Dreykov, the general reveals something about Natasha's past that gives her some mild redemption. But, it also leads her to a greater confrontation.
Some self-aware moments of the movie are how Yelena tries to heckle Natasha's hero poses shown in archive news footage when Natasha lands on the ground. Natasha does one hero pose landing during the breakout of Alexei. Later, Yelena has to jump down from a high spot in the headquarters. Yelena lands on the ground in the same hero pose as she had seen Natasha done in the past. Realising what she had just done, she gets up and shakes off her mild disgust in her own hypocrisy. It was quite amusing.
Without telling you how that the situation with General Dreykov getting resolved, the situation with General Dreykov gets resolved. I found the solution a bit stupid. But then the fun begins with the escape from the other widow -- in fact, trying to save them. Then there is the scene where the headquarters of Dreykov starts falling out of the sky. Oh, did I mention that the headquarters was some harrier jet massive satellite type building flying around the stratosphere? Well, there it is. And that is where the computer-generated imagery takes centre stage.
I could leave out most of the story, so that you get the more enjoyment out of discovering what happens in the movie for yourself. Overall, this is an entertaining blockbuster of a movie. Not the best Avengers movie. But certainly "Black Widow" is on par with its reference "Captain America: Civil War" movie.
I would probably recommend that people watch this movie in theatres, or on an excellent widescreen surround sound home theatre system.
Rating: B. Perhaps a B+ rating because of the quality of the acting.
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