Hammerman Ikon

Hammerman Ikon Film Guide

Haywire
2011
**½
Director: Steven Soderbergh
Cast: Gina Carano, Michael Fassbender, Ewan McGregor, Bill Paxton, Channing Tatum, Antonio Banderas, Michael Douglas, Michael Angarano, Mathieu Kassovitz, Eddie J. Fernandez

Mallory Kane is a Special Ops professional - the female version of Jason Bourne if you will - who hijacks a car and its owner, and recounts to him how she ended up in this pickle. She was double-crossed after her assignment in Barcelona, and now she's out for revenge. Gina Carano, a former mixed martial artist and TV performer, makes a striking acting debut. The rest of the cast also looks impressive, but the trivial characters around Mallory never come alive. Soderbergh's no-nonsense genre movie is built around the fight and chase scenes, which do feel refreshingly physical and unchoreographed. However, Lem Dobbs' script is purely incidental. The film held my interest for 90 minutes, but left me with a strong feeling of meh!