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HANNA

Worf2DS9

Rear Admiral
Rear Admiral
So who's seen this yet?

I saw it on Sunday and really enjoyed it. Saoirse Ronan was awesome. The story was very action-packed and funny at times, notably when Hanna spends time with the travelling family.

The score by The Chemical Brothers was also effective too, giving the actions scenes an extra bit of lift. Eric Bana & Cate Blanchett were also good.
 
And now from the opposite side of the spectrum:

It sucked.

It made "Salt" seem intelligent.

Eric Bana proved once again that he can't act his way out of a wet paper bag.

Cate Blanchett's accent was idiotic.

Saoirse breaks out of the CIA and then hooks up with flower children? Seriously?

And the climactic battle takes place in probably the dumbest setting possible.

It's craptacular.
 
This was the first 2011 movie I've seen so far this year. I thought it was very good; I loved Wright's first two films. Never saw The Soloist, which seems to have been the case for most people.

Good characterization for everybody, though it's not a character-piece by any means.

The thing I liked best about it, as an action film, was that all the characters have weight. Weigler sends three guys after Hanna initially, and they're all dangerous; there's no scene where Hanna or her dad mow through twenty guys without difficulty. Very few action films can make all the mooks a potential threat.
 
I saw it and disliked it.

Immediately after leaving the theater I was iffy, but thinking about it more, it definitely was poor. I looked and was surprised that Ebert rated it at 3 1/2 stars.

For me, I was interested when I thought it would have a lot more about Hanna learning about and living in the world, but the second half of the movie dropped that thread. I thought it would replace it with some kind of other larger story, a larger meaning, to make up for it, but no, it just continued as a rather pointless action scene after scene.

Other things that bothered me (spoilers):

The trailer obviously spoiled us on the reveal that the real Marissa wasn't going to go talk to Hanna in the cell. The set up on the shot was clearly meant to make it a surprise, but it couldn't be. No fault to the director on this one.

One thing that I can blame the director for is when Hanna and Sophie are in the tent talking. They are head to head and feet to feet, facing each other and talking. Yet somehow they are both laying on their left sides. This is as bad as breaking the plane in a two-shot; it just threw me out of the scene. I was concentrating so much on figuring out what felt wrong with the scene, I couldn't get into it.

Maybe I am dense, but why did Hanna start to beat up the Spanish boy who wanted to kiss her? They both seemed into it, but then bam! I can't think of the other times where this happened, but this is just one example of a time where Hanna acted contrary to all apparent motivation in a scene, just to have an out-of-place, funny line of dialogue.

Both Hanna and Eric are shown to be very effective at dealing with opponents (even multiple at one time), but Eric seems to have a lot of trouble with the Skinny Skinhead and Doughy '80s Guy at the end just because the script calls for it.

I guess the CIA planted at least 4 heavily-armed and trained guys at every major transportation hub in Berlin in order to spot Eric arriving at the bahnhof?

Hanna tells Sophie not to follow her, Sophie does and sees her kill, but there is no repercussion to that. Sophie doesn't fail to defend Hanna and keep her secret, Hanna doesn't do anything. After all the build-up, Hanna doesn't care enough about her one friend to try to go back and save her. We also never find out what happens to the family. Were they allowed to go on their way or brutally murdered? Ah who cares, on to the next action sequence.

The bad guys show up at "grandma's house" for no reason what-so-ever at the end. They tossed in a possibly overdubbed line of "off to grandmother's house" to spackle over it, but there was no foundation for it.

And why did Eric run straight at his enemies in the car at the end, but didn't engage them as they got out of the car one by one? Instead he ran away a little bit and then fought them. There was no point to that whole arrangement.

Why did Eric save Hanna (and attempt to save Johanna)? Out of the 20, did he only have the option to save them? Did he like Johanna or Hanna more than the others? What? Why? Who? Despite all the time available to learn such, we are told none of this.

If Eric could find Marissa at home, why the elaborate capture-in-the-arctic plot?

Why did Hanna have such an adverse reaction to finding out that Eric was not her biological father? Did she have any context to find that objectionable? She lived with him her whole life, had no other social standard, had seen no other man or woman her whole life. To me, she should have been like "I wonder what they mean that Eric is not my dad" and then should have asked him about it in the Grandmother's house. I think she realistically would have accepted his not-biological- but actual-father explanation as self-evident and right.

If anyone has some alternate explanations for these points, I would be glad to hear them.

Overall, this movie had great promise. Saoirse Ronan was the highlight, just as she was in City of Ember, but the rest of the movie was a big missed opportunity.
 
Saw it.. Loved it.. Farsical? Yes, in many ways.. And that's just the way it should be.. What about a 16 year old killing machine who gets scared by the TV and telephone wouldn't be..

that said the score, the action, and acting (minus blanchett's bad accent) were great. Eric Bana does very well when the character is to be stoic.. I think he and his agent have realized this and so that's the kind of roles he gets.

My only beef was the lack of resolution with the family.. We got to know them and like them (even the bratty little girl).. Nice to see, however, that American tourists aren't the only ones who can be ugly...

I imagine the resolution was cut for time and will be available on the DVD release. Need to get the soundtrack..
 
For some reason when I see the title of this movie one word comes to mind.
And that word is "Barbera".

am I the only one?
 
^^ Well gee thanks.. Now you got me thinking it... As I said to my wife as the movie ended: "I wonder if she has any sisters..." Sadly, she didn't get the reference and thought I was being serious.. Sigh...
 
Let's see if I got this right she :klingon: kills two Special Forces types to get close to Marissa and kill her and her guard. With the plan of then escaping from a secret CIA prison. But then in the second half of the movie in Spain and Germany she:alienblush: runs from a couple skinheads and a middle aged executive spy.:brickwall:
 
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