Tag: spy

The Harlequin Protocol, by Liane Zane

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Literary rating: ★★★★★
Kick-butt quotient: ☆☆☆☆

This is the second novel in the author’s Unsanctioned Guardians trilogy, a prequel to her earlier Elioud Legacy series. The new trilogy presents the background of how the three heroines of the first one (all of whom were intelligence agents, though of different nationalities) met and formed their sub rosa partnership as off-the-books rescuers of female victims of sexual abuse and trafficking. In the first book, The Covert Guardian, Zane focused entirely on Olivia Markham, who would become the trio’s ringleader, describing her recruitment and first mission with the CIA. Olivia continues to be the main (and almost sole) viewpoint character here, but this installment also introduces the other members of the threesome, Capt. Alzbeta “Beta” Czerna of Czech military intelligence and Anastasia “Stasia” Fiore of Italy’s CIA equivalent, AISE.

My impression is that about two years have passed in Olivia’s career since the previous book (the date for this one, 2011, isn’t mentioned in the text itself as I recall, though it is in the cover copy; but I don’t remember any exact date for the first one.) Here as in all of Zane’s work, her knowledge of spy-craft, of the various brands, specs and capabilities of firearms and explosives used by U.S. and European military and intelligence services, and of the cultural and physical geography of a variety of European settings is a strength of the series, and never delivered intrusively. (Action here moves from Berlin to Brussels, to Prague and the Czech-Polish border region, and to Venice.)

We also get an inside look at the bureaucratic mindset of the present-day CIA (which has been negatively commented on in nonfiction writings by intelligence professionals who know about the subject), the penchant of some of its honchos for turf and ego protection, and the tendencies towards abuse of power that can be endemic in secret organizations. (The latter is a point of contact with John LeCarre’s work, though I suggested in my review of the previous book that Zane’s vision is more like that of Manning Coles or Alistair MacLean –like the latter, she does view espionage in moral terms, as properly concerned with thwarting genuine evil, but she’s also realistic about the moral shortcomings and conflicting agendas that intelligence agencies staffed by fallible humans can be prey to.)

Because the author and I are Goodreads friends, she graciously gifted me with a review copy of the paperback edition of this book, as she has with all of her books, as soon as it was published; though she knew I’d really liked the previous book, she didn’t pressure me for a favorable review, but trusted that the book would stand on its merits. It definitely did; I actually liked this one even better! What earned the added appreciation (and the fifth star) was what I felt was the heightened dimension of moral challenge and choice here, which for me often makes the difference between great and merely good fiction, and which isn’t as strongly present in the first book. Discerning what the right thing is here requires thinking for oneself, not just obeying orders; and deciding to do it comes with a real risk, not just of harm to life and limb, but of disapproval from the powerful, of serious repercussions to one’s career, and maybe of legal punishment. The strong, distinct characterizations of the three heroines, who are each very different individuals though sharing a basic gut instinct for justice and decency, is also a positive feature that makes the book stand out from the pack.

Bad language here is minor. There’s no explicit sex; Olivia stumbles on a gang rape at one point, but it’s not graphically described, and though we see the traumatized and abused victims of sex trafficking (and in one case the dead body of a victim), we aren’t forced to see what they went through. As far as Olivia’s personal life is concerned, it’s briefly mentioned that since the first book, she’s been intimate with only one man, whom she loved and expected to marry (readers of the preceding trilogy will know that didn’t happen!), but the couple’s privacy isn’t violated.

We do have a lot of violence here, and a high body count, but Zane doesn’t make it any more gory than it has to be. IMO, this trilogy should be read in order. However, I wouldn’t say that the previous trilogy necessarily needs to be read first; and it’s really in a different genre(s) than this one, so might not actually appeal to all of the same readers (though I greatly like both). This is neither obviously supernatural fiction (though readers who’ve read the Elioud Legacy will pick up on something that others won’t) nor romance. But it should appeal to all fans of action adventure and espionage fiction, especially those who appreciate heroines in action roles (here, we’ve got not just one but three ladies who can and do kick some serious evil-doer butt!).

Author: Liane Zane
Publisher: Zephon; available through Amazon, both for Kindle and as a print book.
A version of this review previously appeared on Goodreads.

C.A.T.S. Eyes

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★★★
“The not-so Gentle Touch”

This was a sequel to hit series, The Gentle Touch, which had finished its run after five series in November 1984. Police detective Maggie Forbes (Gascoine) has quit the force, but had been recruited by Nigel Beaumont (Warrington) to join a somewhat unofficial Home Office group called Covert Activities Thames Section a.k.a. CATS, along with two other women. Their cover is the “Eyes” detective agency – hence the show’s title. They investigate various crimes and cases, mostly but not exclusively those which pose a threat to British national security. It ran for three series, covering thirty episodes, from April 1985 through June 1987, and was apparently fairly successful in the ratings. 

The obvious inspiration is Charlie’s Angels, in that you have a female trio, of different styles, solving crimes under the loose supervision of a man. However, the differences may be more significant than the similarities. While they do have different personalities, the clearest distinguishing trait in the British show is class, rather than hair colour. There’s working class Fred Smith – short for Frederica (Ash) – middle class Maggie, and upper class Pru Standfast (Rosalyn Landor), replaced after the first season by equally posh Tessa Robinson (Ward). It’s more grounded as well. Although the trio here do sometimes go undercover, it’s not an excuse for cheesecake, with them taking on the roles of women in prison, roller derby girls, etc. The CATS ladies are more likely to be barmaids or hotel workers in the line of duty.

You can also play “Spot the British actor”, with a near-constant stream of guest stars who you might recognize from other places, past or future. As well as Warrington, who’d go on to be the Caribbean commissioner in much-loved Brit-show, Death in Paradise, they include Ray Winstone, Lionel Jeffries, Charles Gray, Marina Sirtis, Peter Capaldi, Anthony Head, James Cosmo, Alan Ford, Ronald Lacey, Penelope Wilton and Alfred Molina. The last-named actually ended up marrying Gascoine in 1986, after his appearance. So that’s nice. The episodes are a bit more of a mixed bag. Some do a good job of capturing the murky world of intelligence, where expedience determines outcomes as much as justice. Other seem frankly implausible. 

Unlike The Gentle Touch, where the work/family balance was a key part of proceedings, we get very little about the trio’s life outside their work. That may be for the best, since Gasgoine is the most effective actress of the three, and things elevate whenever she gets the chance to do her dramatic thing. Action wise, it’s… reasonable. The sponsorship of the Ford Motor Company is kinda obvious, in that almost every episode contains several unnecessary scenes of them driving to or from places, but it’s certainly more credible and genuinely liberated than Charlie’s Angels. While certainly a time-capsule of the eighties (not least the hair!), it has generally stood the test of time reasonably well, and indeed, some aspects may have more resonance now. We watched the show on Sunday mornings, and that may be the best way to approach them.

Creator: Terence Feely
Star: Jill Gascoine, Leslie Ash, Tracy Louise Ward, Don Warrington

Saving Karma, by Reid Bracken

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Literary rating: ★★★
Kick-butt quotient: ☆☆☆½

On Amazon, this is subtitled, “A full-throttle Thailand thriller,” but that’s a little bit of a misleading label. The bulk of the story – at least, the bits that matter – actually take place in China. The book itself goes with “A full-throttle thriller throughout Asia,” Except it starts off in the not-exactly Asian setting of San Bernardino, California, where Bree Thomas is just about to graduate. This is despite the problems of her adopted family, who she was sent to live with after her parents were killed in Thailand. She gets a chance to escape it all, in the form of an apprentice program with the Meng Foundation, a charitable group who help refugees around the world.

Of course, it’s not as simple or easy as it seems. The apprenticeship requires an extremely harsh training regime in the Asian jungle, which really puts Bree through the wringer, though she bonds with another recruit, Japanese girl Nikko. When they come out the other side, they begin the work, including liberating people who are basically slave labourers in a Burmese jade mine. They are then given new lives in an isolated city, New Lingyang, which the Meng Foundation has taken over in the heart of China. Except Bree gradually comes to realize that it’s not the charitable endeavour it initially appears, and there’s a very unpleasant underlying agenda at work.

This started out on shaky ground, with the early stages a shallow portrayal of Bree as little more than a victim. However, once the story took her out of the conventional high-school setting, she becomes a more laudable character, and things improve considerably. There are a few elements which did stretch plausibility too far for my tastes. I really cannot see the CIA director getting her hands dirty in quite the way described here, taking part directly in actions which would never pass congressional oversight: “plausible deniability” is an actual thing. And Bree’s method of escape from the final peril… Well, let’s just say my thoughts echoed those of a character who exclaimed, “Are you fucking kidding me?” on seeing it.

If you can get over those hurdles and accept the premise, you’ll find a solid enough story. It really accelerates in the second half, becoming almost non-stop as Bree figures out the truth behind New Lingyang, and goes on a near-suicide mission to stop it. I also appreciated the irony that she is using skills the Meng Foundation taught her, as well as their resources, in order to take them down. The book does end on a revelation that had me going “Eh?” as much as anything: it doesn’t make much sense at this point. This was clearly intended as an opener for a series, but so far, is the only book by the author – the sequel was supposed to be released in “early 2021”. Maybe we should blame COVID. After all, the Chinese authorities aren’t exactly portrayed very favourably here…

Author: Reid Bracken
Publisher: Independently published, available through Amazon, both as a paperback and an e-book

Save The Girls, by Terry Toler

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Literary rating: ★★
Kick-butt quotient: ☆☆☆

I think I can point almost to the exact point where this one jumped the shark. It had started well enough. Jamie Austen works for the CIA, taking down human traffickers across the world, in conjunction with a non-governmental organization called Save the Girls. Now, I have questions here: why exactly would the CIA care about this, unless American citizens were involved – either as victims or perpetrators? They are not exactly a charitable group, and while certainly a laudable goal, fighting sex trafficking is not generally in their remit. But that aside, Jamie is sent into Belarus to investigate a large ring – moving up to 300 women a month to Russia and Turkey – whose proceeds could be funding terrorism. Ah, that makes more sense.

From the start, the mission begins to go wrong. A local gang try to mug her on the way to meet her contact. While she disposes of them, it causes her to miss the meeting, and also puts her firmly on the radar of the local cops, hampering her future investigation. This forces Jamie into making use of her resourcefulness, in order to make things happen, and following her as she peels away the layers of the onion – for the corruption here goes all the way to the top in Belarus – is interesting stuff. The first misstep is a twist, which brings an unexpected character into play. It stretches credibility heavily, and to a certain extent turns Jamie into a “damsel in distress”, reliant on external help.

A bigger misstep follows. They discover the man behind the ring is also looking to acquire a suitcase-sized nuke, and hold America to ransom. These nukes are held in a nuclear waste management facility, but Toler basically bypasses the entire issue of how Jamie and her colleague recover them. Skips right over it. It’s something to do with using a pass belonging to the Belarus Minister of Transportation. But what you feel should be the action highlight of the book, is basically hand-waved away as a nothing burger. After that, I just could not find it in myself to care about the rest of the story.

The story does continue on for another seventy-five pages or so after this point, with Jamie peeling off on a solo mission to rescue literally thousands of captive women, single-handed. She’s so damn good at whatever she does, you wonder why the CIA is wasting her on freeing foreign nationals. Add in some sloppily-constructed romance, and the overall result is a clearly well intentioned, yet ultimately unsatisfying read. This is a pity, as the first half, despite some qualms, made for decent entertainment, and Toler manages to convey the “exotic” location of the Belarus capital, Minsk, making it come alive. The Cat Museum mentioned in passing is, apparently, a real thing. His narrative: not so much.

Author: Terry Toler
Publisher: Beholdings Publishing, available through Amazon, both as a paperback and an e-book
Book 1 of 12 in the Jamie Austin Thrillers series.

The Irish Connection

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★
“Drop this connection.”

Dear lord, this is a chore. From an opening conversation which unfolds mainly in quotes from Gone With the Wind, Scarface and other, better movies, it was painfully obvious for what writer-director Patrick is aiming. This is supposed to be a Guy Ritchie-esque caper, in which a parade of quirky characters from the underworld jostle for possession of… something.  Hilarity will surely ensue, as they trade foul-mouthed banter, get into and out of sticky situations and generally act in an amusingly inept manner. Except, hilarity most definitely does not ensue. I don’t think I broke into a smile once, with the whole concept being dead on arrival. Malta does look quite nice as a holiday destination though.

The heroine is agent Aureille Fleming (Coduri), though quite who she is an agent of, or why she is involved, never becomes particularly clear. The objects in question are some high denomination bearer bonds, and the film feels obligated to open with a caption explaining what these are. They have been stolen by a man known as The Priest, who flees from Ireland to Malta, and heavily-pregnant crime boss Alice (Spencer-Longhurst) wants them back. Everyone half-competent apparently being otherwise engaged, she sends hapless brother Rory (Robinson) and her husband Casper to the Mediterranean to retrieve them. Fleming – and, yes, it IS a painfully obvious 007 reference – is there to stop the bonds from falling into Alice’s hands, because… I don’t know. Maybe it was explained. I just don’t care.

At times this feels more like a fancy dress party than a film. People dressed up as nuns. People dressed up as clowns. People dressed as priests. This probably isn’t surprising, considering that it feels like Patrick is cosplaying as a film-maker. There’s little or no evidence to indicate he knows how to construct a coherent or interesting narrative. Instead, he proceeds by simply dropping in scenes which, I gueaa, are supposed to be “amusing”, without rhyme or reason. I called Aureille the heroine above, though there’s precious little to make her so. I presumed she is supposed to be the “good guy”, because there are no other credible candidates for that role, so she earns it by default.

I might have forgiven this had the action been up to a decent level. However, the cover is blatantly lying to us about this as well. I do not recall any moment at which she was on a motor-cycle, let alone wielding a gun. Admittedly, it’s possible my attention had wavered to such a degree I didn’t notice. I’m not sure I remember anyone being shot, and must have blinked and missed the helicopter. She throws a few lacklustre punches, and that’s close to the sum total of the action. A genuinely feeble excuse, it would not surprise me if this had been a tax write-off exercise. It’s the only way I can realistically explain the painful level on which this operates.

Dir: Danny Patrick
Star: Rosa Coduri, Flora Spencer-Longhurst, Jack Bence, Shane Robinson

Special Ops: Lioness

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★★★
“Crossing the Lion…”

If 2023 has been underwhelming on the theatrical front (to put it mildly), the various streaming services have certainly had no shortage of entries to keep us occupied here. This one comes to us from Paramount+, and stars Saldaña – already known around these parts, most likely for Colombiana – as CIA operative Joe McNamara, who uses undercover operatives against terrorist groups around the world. Her most recent mission does not end well, and she needs a new operative. She finds one in Cruz Manuelos (De Oliveira), a young woman who finds herself literally falling into the Marines, as a means of escape from a tough life and an abusive relationship. After acing boot camp, she becomes part of McNamara’s team.

The mission involves adopting the identity of a young Muslim woman and befriending Aaliyah Amrohi (Nur), daughter of a very rich Arab. The CIA believe her father is a major source of terrorist funding, but he is very hard to find. Aaliyah is engaged to be married, and her father seems certain to turn up at the wedding. So it’s up to Cruz, in her new identity, to insert herself into Aaliyah’s circle and get invited to the nuptials, so that the target can be neutralized as appropriate. Of course, it’s not quite as simple as that. In addition, Joe has familial issues of her own, as well as having to handle political manoeuvres among the alphabet soup of federal organizations, all with a finger in the pie.

I feel the characters work better than the scenario, which leans too heavily on cliched elements, such as Cruz and Alliyah falling for each other. I rolled my eyes quite hard at that, though it does lean into the “men are bastards” narrative occasionally present here. Hey, it applies both to American and Arab males, so that’s balanced, right? The scene where Cruz got drink-drugged also provoked ocular rotation. Though I was amused when the would-be date-rapist realized he’d bitten off rather more than expected, when a bunch of pissed-off Special Ops people showed up to rescue their comrade. I also enjoyed Wagner, former ditzy co-host of game show Wipeout, playing someone who looks like she’d give Vasquez a tough fight.

The action stuff is certainly well-staged, with De Oliveira giving a good account of herself through the selection process. And, when necessary, as part of her mission – leaving her with some injuries that required a bit of explanation to her new friend. The finale severely ramped up the stakes, especially when the groom-to-be ran Cruz’s face through facial recognition software. It all got… a bit messy thereafter, shall we say. Though it escapes me quite why he never alerted the large security contingent present about the Marine in their midst. If a lot of this doesn’t stand up to close scrutiny, the cast – also including Nicole Kidman and Morgan Freeman – give it their all, and if there turns out to be a second season, we’ll be down for it.

Creator: Taylor Sheridan
Star: Laysla De Oliveira, Zoe Saldaña, Stephanie Nur, Jill Wagner

Assassin’s Vow, by David Bruns and J. R. Olson

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Literary rating: ★★★★
Kick-butt quotient: ☆☆☆☆

Bruns and Olson are retired U.S. Navy officers, Olson in particular with a background in naval intelligence –and that background is drawn on heavily in the various self-published series that he and Bruns co-write. This particular 117-page novella exists only in an electronic edition; in keeping with my usual practice, I’d never have read it, but for the fact that it’s a freebie. Supposedly, it’s the fourth in a succession of “Standalone Suspenseful Short Reads.” In fact, although I read it as a standalone, it actually ties directly into The Pandora Deception, the fourth novel in the authors’ WMD Files series. (The first novel of that series is premised on the conceit that former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein really did have his infamous “weapons of mass destruction,” but cleverly smuggled them out of Iraq before the Americans closed in – okay, this IS fiction.) Our protagonist in this novella, Mossad agent and top-notch assassin Rachel Jaeger, is an important character in the afore-mentioned fourth novel of that series (and possibly others); and indeed, we can surmise that the reason this work is given away for free is so that it can serve as a teaser to draw readers to the series.

Actually, our heroine’s real name is Makda Moretti; “Rachel Jaeger” is her Mossad code name (jaeger means “hunter” in German, and probably also in Yiddish, which is a Germanic language; and Rachel is a name with definite Old Testament associations). Historically, going back to at least New Testament times and possibly back as far as the reign of Solomon, a certain number of blacks in East Africa have identified with the Jewish faith. Rachel was born in Ethiopia, and her mother was one of these (although her mixed race father was half Italian). But though this subculture is mentioned. the authors don’t develop it at all. Their concentration is very much on providing the character’s “origin story.”

We begin en media res, on her first mission as a fledgling operative in a town on the Egyptian Sinai penninsula, where she’s supposed to provide scouting and lookout functions for a team tasked with taking out a terrorist. (But circumstances will cause her role to morph into something more demanding….) Well positioned flashbacks show us how, as a smart, physically fit and observant Tel Aviv Univ. student with a double major in economics and foreign languages, a solid background of martial arts training, and no close family (her mother had recently died, and her brother had emigrated to the U.S.) she was recruited into Mossad. (Later flashbacks show her family’s harrowing trek to Israel from danger in an unraveling Ethiopia, on which her father was killed, when she was a very small child, and a later formative experience of standing up to two bullies in order to defend another child, which shaped her penchant for defending innocents.)

Levi, the slightly older agent who recruited her, initially used the cover of a dating relationship as a medium to get close to her and check her out; this probably began as a ploy on his part, but quickly became much more serious, and the Makda-Levi relationship plays a very crucial role in the plot here. I don’t recommend reading the Amazon book description (the Goodreads database entry doesn’t have any description) because it divulges a lot of the plot, not just the premise. But suffice it to say that personal tragedy will be a shaping force in Rachel’s career. The time frame of the main tale is apparently about two years.

This is not a deep novel wrestling with moral, psychological, spiritual or political issues. There’s no real exploration of the complex roots and merits of the current Israeli vs. Arab hostility. Both Rachel’s and Levi’s role in Mossad is strictly counter-terrorism, combating and forestalling bad actors who would target and murder innocent civilians for political ends. That these people need to be stopped is a moral no-brainer, regardless of your attitudes towards Zionism or Palestinian statehood. Religion plays no role in the tale; Rachel and Levi are strictly secular and identify with Israel on the basis of peoplehood (which in her case is not exactly ethnic either, but more cultural, in a broad sense). The first time that she has to take a life (in self-defense), Rachel experiences some believable psychological distress at the enormity and finality of it, but is able to work through it and come to terms with it fairly quickly, as an action in successful and needed defense of her people; that kind of issue doesn’t arise elsewhere in the book. Despite the Amazon blurb’s overwrought reference to her “inner demons,” we don’t really meet any of the latter, our authors don’t really psycho-analyze her in depth, beyond the obvious feelings.

What it is instead is a straightforward tale of espionage action-adventure, with no real pretensions beyond offering exciting entertainment for readers who appreciate danger, suspense, physical challenges, and the satisfaction of seeing a good gal kick some bad-guy butt. :-) That’s exactly what the authors set out to deliver, and they make good on their promise admirably. This is a very well-written, fast flowing novel, with believable characters, all of them presented in life-like fashion. The prose is thoroughly serviceable, and free of bad language, with the exception of a couple of s-words in one place. (I appreciated that restraint, which I regard as a hallmark of good, tasteful writing.) There are a variety of locales here –Rome, France and Tunisia, in addition to Israel, the Sinai and East Africa, as already mentioned– and while they’re not necessarily realized with a deep sense of place (remember, this is a 117-page novella!), all of the physical settings are described vividly enough that we can easily visualize them.

Inside knowledge of espionage trade-craft and the inner workings of an intelligence agency is incorporated seamlessly into the narrative, giving it a solid feeling of verisimilitude. Our authors refrain from depicting explicit sex, and they treat sexual matters in general with restraint. It’s mentioned that Makda and Levi began sharing her bed after they’d been dating two weeks, but it’s left at that, and the feelings between the two, in fairness, are much more intense than the short time span suggests. (Normally I’m skeptical of insta-love scenarios in fiction, especially in a modern setting, but it carried complete credibility here.)

One scene had both Rachel and the target of one of her hits naked at one point, because she was posing as a prostitute in order to carry out her mission, but there’s no gratuitous physical description and no sexual activity takes place. (It’s a disgusting scene only because of the repugnant nature of the target’s exploitative and misogynistic attitudes, but he’s meant to be disgusting.) As an action adventure yarn with a government-sanctioned assassin for a main character, it’s going to feature lethal violence directly described, but there’s restraint here too; there’s no wallowing in gore for its own sake, and neither the authors nor Rachel are sadistic. (She’ll deliver certain death to her marks –who inspire no particular pity!– with consummate efficiency, but she”ll deliver it quickly and cleanly.)

My high rating reflects the degree of skill with which the authors deliver on the conventions of their genre, as well as my enjoyment of the tale (I’d easily have read it in one sitting if my time had allowed!). The only negative I felt is that Rachel’s character arc here doesn’t leave her, emotionally, in as good a place at the end as her friends would want her to be. (And by the time you finish the book, if you read it, you’ll probably also count yourself among her friends. :-) ) To be fair, however, that’s because it’s not a complete arc; the authors have at least one more adventure for her, in a full-length novel that will probably allow for much more progress in her personal life journey. Sadly, I don’t plan to witness it; at the age of 70 and with a gargantuan TBR, I don’t choose to get sucked into the welter of Bruns’ and Olsen’s various series, so I read this as a stand-alone. But I wish our heroine well; and can unhesitatingly recommend at least this start of her saga to all fans of espionage thrillers and action heroines!

Author: David Bruns and J. R. Olson
Publisher: Reef Points Media; available through Amazon, currently only as an electronic book.
A version of this review previously appeared on Goodreads.

Heart of Stone

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★★
“Entertainment: Impossible”

The Great 2023 Void of Action Heroines continues on. The closest thing we’ve seen to one as a mainstream hit in the cinemas is… um, Barbie. Yeah. Not going there. I was looking at the box-office chart for the year, and excluding movies which were actually released in 2022 e.g. Everything Everywhere All at Once, there is only one single film in the top two hundred we have covered here. Polite Society sits outside the top hundred, at $1,.5m [We will get round to The Wrath of Becky in a bit. It’s #181, with a gross of $168,109.] Last year, we had Everything and The Woman King in the top thirty. 2021 gave us Black Widow; 2020, Birds of Prey and Wonder Woman 1984. The complete lack of tentpole heroines this year is disconcerting.

There has been no shortage of female supporting characters who have kicked butt. We already wrote about the The Women of Mission: Impossible, while John Wick 4 also delivered in this category, among quite a few other successful movies. But if you want to see a GWG take centre-stage, you will not find it in the movies. In some ways, it’s more convenient, to be able to sit at home, in your own comfy chair, with a choice of reasonably-priced snacks, and simply push a button on your remote control. But, it has to be said: quality wise, there’s often a good reason most of these films have gone straight to a streaming service. We’ve already covered a number here. The Mother. Furies. Mercy Falls. True Spirit. Some were decent. Yet none have achieved a seal of approval.

This one certainly won’t, barely reaching the level of acceptable entertainment, and sadly, continuing Gal Gadot’s streak of swings and misses. She blazed onto the scene in Wonder Woman back in 2017, and seemed set to take over the mantle as one of the top action actresses in Hollywood. But she has singularly failed to build on that foundation. She lost a lot of public goodwill for her tone-deaf Imagine video in the pandemic. WW84 was a flop, Red Notice was a quickly-forgotten Netflix Original, and her turn in Death on the Nile was widely-panned, becoming a meme. This, however, was a chance to correct course, putting her front and centre in a movie which, it was clearly hoped, would kick-start a franchise and become the female version of Mission: Impossible.

Ain’t gonna happen.

Two minutes in, Chris turned to me and said, “Is this a movie or a TV series?” and I can see her point. Having watched this just a couple of weeks after the undeniably cinematic Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One, the difference is obvious. Harper directed The Aeronauts, which was decent enough, but it seems he is incapable of scaling things up from a balloon basket, to the much larger scope needed here. Part of the problem with the action sequences in particular, is the VR enhancement gimmick the heroine wears, allowing her to get real-time updates from her handler. This too often leaves everything looking like it’s a video-game, and it rubs off on other sequences, such as her parachute jump, which feels thoroughly unconvincing.

The plot is perhaps an even greater weakness, a confusing and unengaging mess. Rachel Stone (Gadot) works for a group called Charter, who use hi-tech surveillance for good (yeah… about that…). She’s embedded as an agent in MI-5, for reasons that are never made clear. Wouldn’t you know it, one of the people on her team, Parker (Dornan), turns out to be plotting to steal The Heart, the super-computer on which Charter relies for their surveillance – and use it, presumably, not for good. He has teamed up with talented young hacker Keya Dhawan (Bhatt) to this end, and only Stone can stop them, recover The Heart, and save her colleagues at Charter, including Stone’s boss Nomad (Okenedo).

Dear god, I almost lost consciousness merely typing the previous paragraph. Reviewing the previous work of writers Greg Rucka and Allison Schroeder, what stands out is an almost complete lack of action movies. Rucka has worked mostly in comics (including the one which became The Old Guard), while Schroeder did, um, Christopher Robin and Hidden Figures. The lack of experience shows. Never mind not having written an action movie, it feels as if neither of them had seen an action movie. If so, they might have realized Stone’s handler flicking VR screen around by gesture, was done twenty years ago in Minority Report. The good ideas here are all like that, things you’ve seen elsewhere, and done better, while the ones the movie can call its own are uninspired in concept and/or execution.

It doesn’t help that the supporting cast are mostly bland. If Gadot does still have reasonable charisma, Dornan is completely forgettable. Bhatt is a thoroughly unconvincing hacker – I might trust her to reset my account password, and apologize for the inconvenience. That’s about it. The most irritating character though, is probably her handler. I get what they were going for, but almost every time he’s involved, it leaves the heroine feeling not much more than a meat-puppet, removing a significant degree of agency from her. I will say, some of the action set-pieces aren’t too bad. There’s a good car-chase through Lisbon, for example. But any secret organization which fills its airship with hydrogen, is certainly not going to remain secret for very long. That’s the level of idiocy we are dealing with in the writing here.

Long before the end, I had mentally checked out, as the film globe-trotted manically from [checks notes] the Alps to London to Portugal to Senegal to Iceland. There’s no denying there was a significant amount of resources expended on this production, though Netflix is notoriously tight-lipped on specific budgets. However, the film doesn’t so much jump the shark, as use it for a 3000-metre steeplechase, when the MI-5 spies have a dance break. Read the sentence again. Roll it around your brain. That it’s to a Lizzo song – unfortunate timing, that – makes it considerably worse. Everything thereafter feels like a waste of those resources, as well as the variable talents of those involved.

Dir: Tom Harper
Star: Gal Gadot, Jamie Dornan, Alia Bhatt, Sophie Okonedo

Shelter

  By

★★★½
“Never trust the Jews.”

The above is said by an Arab character, passing on advice from her father. By the end of it, despite this being an Israeli-produced movie, you may be inclined to agree with them. Mind you, on the basis of this, you should also never trust, the Arabs, Americans or Germans either. This dive into the world of intelligence, counter-intelligence and realpolitik is so morally murky, it should come with a head-lamp, to assist viewers peering into the darkness. Naomi (Riskin) is a Mossad agent, who has been out of the game for two years, since her husband, a fellow spy, was killed in a terrorist attack. She has now been tasked with what should be a simple job, guarding Hezbollah informant Mona (Farahani).

The latter has just been spirited out of the Middle East, after her cover was blown. Mona had plastic surgery and is recuperating in Hamburg for two weeks, before beginning a new life in Canada. Except, nothing in the world of spydom is ever “simple.” Hezbollah are very keen not to let Mona’s treachery escape unpunished, and Naomi’s nerves are on a knife-edge of perpetual tension, with even a simple wrong number telephone call triggering paranoia. Yet she has every reason to be suspicious. For far above the two women’s heads, wheels are in motion. America want to defeat ISIS, and needs Iran’s help. Iran supports Hezbollah. So if the price of Iran’s co-operation is merely an informant who is no longer of use…

“We take care of our people,” is an oft-repeated mantra, particularly by Naomi’s handler, Gad (Ashkenazi). But by the end, you’ll be feeling it’s more a sick joke than genuine commitment. While he may mean well, his hands are largely tied in terms of actual care. The reality is closer to Spock’s line in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan: “The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few”. Naomi is aware of this, though matters aren’t helped by Mona’s fatalistic approach: “This apartment is cursed,” she mutters at one point. They do inevitably bond, mostly over children: Mona had to leave her son behind, Naomi is trying to conceive via a sperm donor. Though there’s also a makeover session, which is a bit cringey, to be honest – albeit, a makeover session which eventually proves  necessary to the plot.

However, when this is simply focusing on screwing up the tension, Riklis does a fine job, creating a world where anyone and everyone is potentially a lethal threat. Hyper-vigilance is an essential trait for survival, since a casual look can be the only warning you get. Yet that way lies inevitable burnout on an overdose of adrenaline. I’m not 100% certain the final twists quite deliver, at least from a logical point of view: I have questions, is all I can say on the topic. Yet they do deliver a satisfactory emotional payoff, and the journey to get there has been fine as well.

Dir: Eran Riklis
Star: Neta Riskin, Golshifteh Farahani, Lior Ashkenazi, Doraid Liddawi

Sheroes

  By

★★★
“Zeroes to sheroes.”

Twenty minutes into this, I was certain I had made a terrible mistake. These four young women were among the most grating and unpleasant characters I’d seen in a movie. I’m talking actively awful: crass, shallow and entitled. They head off to Thailand for a girls’ getaway on a private jet owned by the father of Diamond (Luss), a film producer. By the time they land, check out their mansion and enjoy the local sights, I was ready to set up the guillotines. Then there’s a luggage mix-up, leaving them with a large quantity of Thai cartel coke, and one of their number is kidnapped, in order to coerce them into returning the goods.

Which is where something unexpected happened. The film became… Well, “good” might be a stretch – plausibility is not the script’s strong suit. But it became considerably more entertaining, that’s for certain. Diamond turns out to have hidden depths, and coaches skater girl Ryder (Day) and actress Ezra (Fuhrman) on what they’re going to do to get their friend Daisy (Skai Jackson) back. They have some help from the mysterious Jasper (Kesy), but they’re mostly reliant on their own skills, at least until the very end. It also nods to other films in an occasionally meta way. For instance, Diamond coaches Ezra to deliver Liam Neeson’s classic Taken speech to the kidnappers. It’s particularly funny, because that was written by Luc Besson, and Luss is best known as the star of Anna… directed by Besson.

She is really the glue that holds the film together for the bulk of the running-time, coming over as both smart and capable, and I’d watch her in a franchise. You do have to suspend disbelief in quite a few places, e.g. the trio are capable of using a 3D printer to create a mask which Ezra uses to impersonate someone. [It was a stretch in Mission: Impossible, with all the resources of the IMF] Or Ryder being capable of taking down a trained mixed martial-arts fighter, who’s probably a hundred pounds heavier. Then there’s the final battle, where they take out an entire camp of Thai drug-runners. Yeah: this whole film might as well be titled “I’m so sure…”

Yet, I was able to put that aside, and found myself, surprisingly, being adequately entertained. There’s a lot of value wrung out from the exotic locations, while the cinematography is crisp and well-executed. And let’s be honest, the heroines are easy on the eye and spent more time than is strictly necessary in bikinis. The R-rating seems largely a result of bad language and drug use. I’d like to have seen it embraced in the action elements as well, which could have been more hard-hitting. But as a frothy concoction, this feels as if it is going down a similar line as something like DOA: Dead or Alive. Not quite as good – yet considering how very low my opinion was at the beginning, recovering to a three-star rating is impressive. 

Dir: Jordan Gertner
Star: Sasha Luss, Isabelle Fuhrman, Wallis Day, Jack Kesy