Based upon characters and situations created by Marvel Comics
Story by Jac Schaeffer and Ned Benson
Screenplay Written by Eric Pearson
Directed by Cate Shortland
*** (three stars)
RATED PG 13
Several years ago, when it was first announced that at long last, there would be a solo feature film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe starring the superspy Natasha Romanoff, otherwise known as Black Widow I have to admit that I was one of seriously mixed feelings.
Now, to get everything straight between myself and all of you, it had absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with having a Marvel film centered around a female character. And to that end, it most certainly had nothing whatsoever to do with how the character had been portrayed by Scarlett Johansson.
Over the course of 10 years and seven increasingly significant and finally, essential appearances throughout the ever growing Marvel saga, Scarlett Johansson continuously shaped what could have easily existed as a stereotypical (and sexist) female sidekick, emphasizing her looks and figure over the content of her character, and ultimately devised a hero whose empathy, pathos and gravitas carried equal weight to those of her compadres in Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) and Steve Rogers (Chris Evans), and her relationships with both Cliff Barton a.k.a. Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner) and Bruce Banner (Mark Ruffalo) were crucial ones that did not solely exist to serve the male characters but to grow the backstory and inner world of Natasha Romanoff with regards to her emotional isolation and need for a sense of family, connection and home.
Natasha Romanoff more than deserved her own film without question. My hesitation stemmed from my long written about superhero movie fatigue combined with the fact that once her film was given the green light, the full knowledge of her character's fate as presented in Anthony and Joe Russo's "Avengers: Endgame" (2019) was widely known, therefore giving the prospect of such a film more than a bit of an anti-climactic feeling.
And well...what a difference a global pandemic makes.
Scheduled for release in 2020 yet shifted three times and finally, postponed entirely in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic, Director Cate Shortland's "Black Widow" is finally here and for me, I was actually more than ready, and even a bit excited, to see it. Perhaps the 18 month absence from the movie theaters played its part. Most certainly, the three outstanding Marvel television series--Creator Jac Schaeffer and Director Matt Shakman's "WandaVision" (2021), Creator Malcolm Spellman and Director Kari Skogland's "The Falcon and the Winter Soldier" (2021) and Creator Michael Waldron and Director Kate Herron's "Loki" (2021)--more than played their parts. Yet, when all was said and done, "Black Widow" was a solid if straight down the middle Marvel experience. One that was satisfying overall but also one that did indeed house a certain share of feeling more like a placeholder, despite various elements that did provide a serious emotional resonance as well as a fitting farewell for our leading heroine.
Positioned in between the events of Anthony and Joe Russo's "Captain America: Civil War" (2016) and "Avengers: Infinity War (2018)," Cate Shortland's "Black Widow" finds Natasha Romanoff (Scarlett Johansson) on the run as a government fugitive for violating the Sokovia Accords, leaving some of her compatriots in the Avengers imprisoned, some working in full adherence to the Accords, ultimately fracturing apart the union the Avengers once had.
After fleeing to a safehouse located in Norway, Natasha is pulled into a new adventure which directly links her current status as an Avenger to her past as a trained KGB assassin and even further, to her childhood, when she and her surrogate sister Yelena Belova (Florence Pugh, who nearly steals the movie) were delivered by their Russian secret agents and surrogate parents, the Alexei Shostakov a.k.a. the super serum enhanced Red Guardian (David Harbour) and Scientist/spy Melina Vostokoff (Rachel Weisz), to Russian General Dreykov (Ray Winstone), head of the Red Room, where stolen young girls are trained and brainwashed into becoming assassins.
This personal crossroads propels Natasha into a globe trotting escapade involving reunions, new adversaries, including the formidable Taskmaster (Olga Kurylenko) and the opportunity to not only reclaim the family she had once lost but to potentially serve as an..ahem...avenging angel for the worldwide fleet of Black Widow assassins, all stolen and enslaved just as she was.
In keeping with the Marvel Cinematic Universe aesthetic, Cate Shortland's "Black Widow" is a visually gripping installment, keeping itself firmly in line tonally with the 1970's style conspiracy format as developed in the Russo brothers' "Captain America: The Winter Soldier" (2014) as well the aforementioned "Captain America: Civil War" and "The Falcon and the Winter Soldier."
Despite the grittier atmosphere, a strong opening sequence featuring Natasha and Yelena as children, an and especially harrowing opening credit sequence, the film really does take its considerable time to really get itself going and not in the very best way. This is not due to deliberate pacing. Quite the contrary, Shortland gives it her all to dole out the requisite Marvel set pieces and action sequences including a breakneck motorcycle chase in Budapest and some nifty fight choreography when Natasha Romanoff battles the Taskmaster.
And yet, we have seen all of this before...in Marvel features as well as anything starring Ethan Hunt, Jason Bourne, James Bond and the entire "Fast and the Furious" family. In doing so, when we should be enthralled or on the edges of our theater seats, we shrug our shoulders and stifle yawns with the over familiarity. Granted, in this age of such heavily recycled material, it really takes some heavy innovation to make something as tired as a car chase feel new or is at least exciting...but it can be done in the right cinematic hands as evidenced in Edgar Wright's exhilarating "Baby Driver" (2017).
But just sticking to the MCU itself, the filmmakers have truly raised their own bar in these last several years creatively and thematically, as they have extended themselves further than just being "comic book movies." Ryan Coogler's "Black Panther" (2018) especially, plus the aforementioned "WandaVision" and game changing "Loki," Marvel has nearly re-invented themselves with regards to purpose and invention. So, for its first third or so, "Black Widow" feels like a few steps backwards, with seemingly lower stakes, and in doing so, I was less invested in the outcome, even moreso as the ultimate fate of Natasha Romanoff is already known.
Yet, after the initial pyrotechnics, Shortland settles down and sharpens her narrative as "Black Widow" grows surprisingly quieter as the principal characters of Natasha's family reunite and therefore, reveal themselves to each other as well as the audience, with sharply written scenes that showcase considerable humor, and grace notes that play out within the character's futures but serve as callbacks to us in the audience. But, most of all, Cate Shortland's attention to character, empathy and emphasis of humanity over CGI bombast then takes the center stage, which then allows the actions sequences and the film overall to gain and emotional intensity and larger purpose on the whole, for the film and the fullness of Natasha Romanoff herself.
It was very clever for Cate Shortland and her screenwriters to set the story of "Black Widow" within this section of the MCU timeline as this is indeed the point when Natasha finds herself n a position of being a lone wolf again, just as we first met her in Jon Favreau's "Iron Man 2" (2010). It is a new starting point for Natasha as her childhood family is non-existent and her new Avengers family has essentially broken up...just like The Beatles, as Bruce Banner quips incredulously in "Avengers: Infinity War."
This tactic therefore allows "Black Widow" the opportunity to exist as more than just yet another "comic book movie," as Natasha Romanoff embarks upon an inner journey upon which she re-discovers what family means to her and how it exists in her world with her surrogate parents and the Avengers, while also delving into the more immediate tale of female subjugation, entrapment, empowerment and emancipation in her attempts to defeat General Dreykov and free all of the Black Widow assassins from his insidious clutches.
I deeply appreciated how Cate Shortland injected a pure feminist stance within "Black Widow," utilizing the thread of human trafficking as the film's and main character's haunted core, one that serves the character exceedingly well with regards to her motivation within this film's story as well as her motivation within the full arc of the saga.
And as Natasha Romanoff's conduit, Scarlett Johansson again shows how and why this role has been tailor made for her and how she has commandeered the conception and execution of her ever since her debut. In doing so, the high flying climax of the film set in the Red Room and spiraling through the skies, the weight of all of the story threads and themes snap together with a stirring earnestness. No, we don't have something as visceral and bracing as what we witnessed with Charlize Theron in George Miller's superlative "Mad Max: Fury Road" (2015), but we are in that ballpark and what results is a sense of triumph as well as elegy, as Shortland delivers the proper farewell that Natasha Romanoff was denied in "Avengers: Endgame."
While not one of the great Marvel entries, Cate Shortland's "Black Widow" is a good one, if a bit muted and modest. And yes, the post-credits scene is a doozy, setting up very interesting new conflicts to come. But for now, it is time to give a proper farewell to a character who was kind of a Marvel dark horse, yet truly and deeply served as much of the entire series' moral conscious. And you know, I think beyond the costumes and the capes, the special effects, stunts and cliff hangers, we have so powerfully embraced the Marvel Cinematic Universe due to the filmmakers' commitment to always treating these over the top figures as living, breathing human beings with foibles and faults, doubts and demons just as the late, great Stan Lee originally conceived.
As operatic as these stories can be, the humanity and morality reigns supreme...just as it should, and just as Natasha Romanoff championed.
