Red Sparrow- a movie review // Jennifer Lawrence goes undercover

Just tiny spoilers ahead of you. 

A brief story of the plot

A renowned ballerina- Dominika Egorova (Jeniffer Lawrence), filled with poised techniques and formations encountered a hasty injury onstage. This incident resulted in a grave of her dancing career.

As her mother fell limper by day, the need for medication arises. Due to the unexpected injury onstage, she is no longer able to pay for her mother’s care.

The only solution at this point is to seal a deal with her manipulative, uncanny uncle. Desperate times call for extreme measures right? If she doesn’t, she would be killed without any compromise.

He sends her to “whore” school in Russia where they specialize in training sparrows. Here, they are ought to manipulate their bodies for weapons. Through the act of seduction, they are obliged to use their bodies as tools to extract information from others.

After showing her enriching skills and applying intricate techniques, she was sent out on her very first mission. Accentuating the hatred between the US-Russia relations, she was sent out to seduce and extract information from an American Agent.

Will she succeed in the mission or will she cause a major backlash for the Russian party?

Characters

Honestly, throughout the entire movie, the only thing that sparked my attention was Jennifer Lawrence’s complexion and figure. Her natural beauty shines from within, and it is indeed a sight you will not be able to shift.

She glowed throughout the movie – with her unintended natural beauty. Girl, she doesn’t even need to try.

Besides her physical appearances, she seemed to have a hard time adapting to the Russian accent. Although she is a notable actress, believably, there are other Russian actresses that may be able to pull off the accent much smoother.

Although in my opinion, this movie does not show much justice as for Lawrence’s talents as an individual and as an actress. Her character was often bleak, filled with desperation, blank.

Most of her actions weren’t translating her humorous, witty self. The movie could do a lot better with a few comical scenes to instill a right balance between the bleakness and hope.

Yes, the film does reclaim itself throughout the middle to the end when her complex, articulating scheme uncovers. We were finally able to grasp the compelling, persuasive and intelligent woman she is.

General ambience

The movie felt relentlessly stiff and stale throughout. You know the feeling when you can feel it reaching its climax, but it declines immediately? Hence the peak isn’t thoroughly handled nor appropriately expressed.

The entire film was filled with snippets of explicit, gory- accented with rape scenes, sexual obligations, and nudity. There was an uncomfortable sensation throughout, shifting between an unsure tone and pushing the boundaries at the same time.
There was a tightrope between the director attempting to break boundaries and suppressing the activity of going too far.

There were some reasonably awkward occurrences during the sexual content as they seemed almost abrupt, lacking passion and thrill.

Personal thoughts

Having to sit through 2 hours of this movie was surprisingly alright- some parts made up for the distressingly explicit, somewhat torturous scenes.

Especially the parts when Dominika was in “whore” school- this accentuates the fact that both women and men are subjected to the lack of consent in society today.

In “whore” school, they didn’t have a say in their own ownership. They had to strip their clothes off whenever they were told- just like how their rights were slowly stripping away.

They were trained to believe that “my body is my country’s.” This statement quickly resonates with the individuals in society today- we are always told what to do, how to act, how to dress to reach a specific social hierarchy.

We always have the need to conceal, contain our inner selves and act a certain kind of way to match up with the general public. It’s so easy that our individualism often gets exploited by other people.

Or the fact that we are often judged by our physicality rather than who we truly are. Often, we get lost trying to fit a rubric. We lose ourselves along the way, and we allow other people to get ahold of us.

This is what Red Sparrow is all about- allowing your country to manifest what they believe is the best for you- based off your physicalities. Rather than caring for your actual wellbeing.

Overall, I’m not the biggest fan of this movie- but some parts of it resonated with me as an individual and there were some sparks to it.

Toodles,

Sandra™