Red Sparrow

Based on the 2013 novel of the same name, I first came across Red Sparrow when seeing the teaser trailer in the cinema and it teased enough to catch my interest. It looked like the combination between David Fincher's trademark 'edgy' style of filmmaking and John le Carré's world of espionage coming together. I was excited and always enjoy the spy aspects of James Bond and Harry Palmer films so it looked like this would finally deliver something cinema had been lacking for a while. And, with a talented cast that includes Jennifer Lawrence, Joel Edgerton, Matthias Schoenaerts, Charlotte Rampling and Jeremy Irons, Red Sparrow appeared to have all the right pieces for a satisfying experience.

Jennifer Lawrence stars as a Russian ballerina who is purposefully tripped mid-performance and sees her promising career ruined forever. With an ailing mother to look after, her uncle offers her work and is then taken to a spy school to put herself in the line of duty for her country and identify a mole in the system. The story has a familiar sense of Cold War thrillers with Joel Edgerton's rogue CIA agent and Charlotte Rampling's cruel Russian teacher known only as Matron, and director Francis Lawrence uses this all to not reinvent the wheel but create an intriguing thriller.

I did find that Red Sparrow isn't all it wants to be though and seems to suffer somewhat with translating as many aspects from the book to the screen as possible, and the story doesn't quite deliver on the tense experience I had hoped for. Lawrence is great in the lead role with a challenging accent that she controls brilliantly to the point I no longer saw the actress but the character, however she deserved a more enticing storyline to match her superior performance.

Nonetheless, it was refreshing to have a film like this again and despite it's flaws it still managed to entertain even through several moments of strong violence. Red Sparrow does feel like a good film trapped within the bindings of its source material which do not always translate well to the big screen but there's enough here to recommend and it should just about satisfy anyone interested. It's not quite John le Carré' but will keep us spy fans going until the next adaptation.