Kate

The world works in a kind of spiral, where everything 30 years ago becomes popular again, with small alterations. Kate is a story of a perfect assassin, betrayed and raising hell in the name of vengeance as poison is slowly killing her. Stylish, with Japanese neo-noir design, involving the Yakuza and greedy Westerners, it is a return to the 90s stories, where lone gunmen (people?) were dealing their own brand of justice in a corrupt and decadent world full of greed and inequality. Of course, the main character is female now, but you've seen this film before, a few times perhaps, and everything is pretty standard.

What shines trough the bland plot is the acting of Mary Elizabeth Winstead, who singlehandedly carries the film through. In fact, every other actor is an extra in the plot anyway, so she either made this film work or not. And it works. Kudos also to Jun Kunimura, who can, with a slight adjustment of body posture and a couple of facial expressions, tell an entire story in a second.

Bottom line: a predictable story from start to finish, but made well and acted well. Ridiculous body count which could have, with small changes to the plot, be significantly reduced and the time gained spent on storytelling.

When 'Kate' (Mary Elizabeth Winstead), an expert sniper and lethal assassin, botches a job, she learns she has been poisoned and only has about 24hours to live. With her handler, Varrick (Woody Harrelson), she tries to finish her contract before she dies.

This film plays out much like 'Crank' (2006), in that Kate is on the verge of death and has to rely on using stimulants to keep moving. The cinematography is great and the casting is solid, especially with the snarky antics of Ani (Miku Patricia Martineau), but falls a little short in terms of believability. The twist at the end is predictable, but satisfying.

Worth a watch!

I have a major crush on Winsted. Having said that, good fights, bad cgi car chase. Watchable.

So ok this is my take. Every year the big studios are handed scripts, many scripts and many are rejected. How many scripts with the whole "trained assassin" have we seen? Netflix must get thousands with the same bloody main plot, and reject them. Warner Bros, Sony probably do too and keep maybe 2 out of a hundred. Netflix, on the other hand, get (say) a hundred of these assassin scripts and keep 50, and seemingly work through them making movies to fill a need. They love them. They tolerate much more, lame and average scripts, than you would expect a movie studio to... but then they are essentially a TV station, and have more time to fill.

This film is your typical double-hard assassin movie. Well made - I like the lead and supporting cast - plus it looks good, is watchable, but ultimately is generic and predictably unoriginal. The plot will have no surprises, and will be the least interesting aspect, but it won't offend you too much either. Maybe as a slightly older person, I have seen too many movies like this to be involved and excited by it. Were I half my age, with less experience of such film, I might have better things to say. As it stands, if you like this kind of assassin getting revenge movie, you'll have a good time. Just do not expect anything new here.

This was a La Femme Nikita/DOA situation filtered though live action anime with touches of the current slate of action movies like Atomic Blonde, Hardcore Henry, The Raid, and John Wick.

I guess I don't get the critics being harsher on this than any other action movie of late. Stuff happens. Action happens. Some more stuff happens. Some more action happens. It's a fun romp that dosnt outstay it's welcome. And you get to see a unique fight haircut.