The Rhythm Section movie review

MOVIE TITLE:  The Rhythm Section

RATING: R

LENGTH:      1 hour, 49 minutes

Movie Review Mom GRADE:   C+

IN A NUTSHELL:

This dramatic thriller was written by Mark Burnell and based on the first novel in his The Rhythm Section: A Stephanie Patrick Thriller (Stephanie Patrick Thrillers Book 1) series.  Unfortunately, this movie is scoring fairly low with audiences, so it may not turn into the successful franchise that his books have.  However, based on the fact that everyone in the audience I watched the movie with was a middle-aged man, the beautiful Blake Lively will most likely get a sequel out of this gritty film.  It was directed by female director Reed Morano, and features a woman who sets off on a journey to get revenge and justice because her entire family was killed in an airplane bombing.

Some are describing the movie as an anti-James Bond spy film because Blake Lively isn’t a spy and she’s not very good at the revenge business.  It’s less about the action and global conspiracies, and more about the futility of revenge in the search for peace and meaning.  I actually liked the fact that she wasn’t a super spy with cool gadgets and years of training.  She seemed like an everyday, realistic girl trying to cope with her loss and find justice in the world.  By the way, if you’re excited about the newest installment of James Bond films, MGM just announced that it’s release has been pushed back to April 8, 2020.

TIPS FOR PARENTS:

• Bloody
• Lots of violence with various weapons and hand-to-hand combat
• Dead bodies
• Profanity
• Drugs
• Prostitution
• You see Blake Lively in her underwear and other sexy garments.
• Radical Islamic cleric promotes terrorism
• Picture of a naked woman on the wall.

THEMES:

• Justice
• Revenge
• Spies
• Survival
• Guilt
• Healing
• Closure

THINGS I LIKED:

• Blake Lively has proven to be an effective action protagonist, after grabbing everyone’s attention in The Shallows.  She really gives it her all and was even injured during the filming, which halted production for a time.
• Intense music by Hans Zimmer.
• Some really interesting camera shots.
• There are some exciting action scenes that look like they were shot in one take.  That’s always impressive.  One is a car chase that looks like it’s shot by someone sitting right next to Blake Lively.
• You get to go with Blake Lively to interesting locations in Tangier, England, Scotland, and Madrid.
• I thought the title of the movie was clever.  You’ll hear several times during the movie what it means.

THINGS I DIDN’T LIKE:

• Blake Lively is gorgeous, yet in this movie, she is very plain and real. You can always tell when a beautiful actress wants to be taken really seriously in her career by how plain she allows herself to look in a movie.  Charlize Theron should probably win an award for how terrible she looked in Monster and more recently in Tully  I couldn’t relate to Blake Lively in the The Age Of Adaline because she was too rich and gorgeous, and we were supposed to feel sorry for her in that movie, but in this movie, she was very real.  Unfortunately, I had a hard time relating to her because of her terrible choices.  It’s hard to feel endeared to her when her entire mission is pure revenge.  She’s haunted by the fact that so many innocent people died in an airplane bombing, but her poor decisions and lack of skills also cause innocent people to die in the film.  A few times, her American accent slipped through her attempt at a British one.
• So many scenes linger way too long.
• The character development unfolds in a strange way.
• When Charlize Theron kicked butt in Atomic Blonde, she did most of her own stunts, so there were long action sequences that remained uncut.  In this movie, there is a lot of editing.
• Too many flashbacks make the movie longer than it needs to be and even becomes annoying at times.
• I hate shaky cam.
• Some of the scenes are filmed in a strange way.  For example, she’s thinking about what to do and you watch what’s going to happen, so it reduces the tension when it actually unfolds because you’ve already seen it.
• Odd music choices that don’t quite match what you’re seeing, and then, all of a sudden, the upbeat music will just cut out and you’re left to the somber drama again.
• No humor, unless you count the entertaining fight scene between Blake Lively and Jude Law…which I do.
• The grey color palette makes everything seem especially dreary and boring.
• A few times there are scenes that happen at night or in dark rooms, so it might be hard to see what’s going on if you watch this movie on a small screen once it goes to DVD and streaming.
• It’s a very slow burn.

INTERESTING LINES:

• “Drugs, prostitution.  It’s not a tragedy.  it’s a cliche.” –  B   (Jude Law)
• “You’re another victim.  You’re just not dead yet.” – Proctor   (Raza Jaffrey)
• “Is it because I’m a woman? – Stephanie Patrick    (Blake Lively)          “There are plenty of women as good as men.” –  B  (Jude Law)     “Then make me one of them.”  – Stephanie

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