Star: Angelina Jolie

Assassins

Mr & Mrs Smith (2005) – Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie

This is a weird movie, with some very good attributes and some areas lacking. It’s like an action packed assassins movie crossed with a cheesy slow romantic drama, crossed with satirical comedy.

Brad and Angie are of course legends in practically everything they do, and this is the movie they hooked up on, to become the Brangelina supercouple. So in a way, this movie was the reason Brad divorced Jennifer Aniston, although the writing was already on the wall for Jennifer as she didn’t age too well.

Brad Pitt plays John Smith, and Angelina Jolie plays his wife, Jane Smith. Both are assassins, purely by co-incidence, and working for rival firms. They’re married to each other yet somehow managing to hide their real jobs from each other, until eventually they bump into each other when they have the same target to kill. Then they need to kill each other, and they try to, but then they fall in love again. It’s a simple cheesy story, with plenty of fun to it, a fair amount of good action, and an extremely lighthearted vibe.

This movie had potential to be a lot better as an action movie, but due to its mix-up of genres and its general weirdness and most likely complacency (like we see in practically all movies where multiple superstars come together, although “too many cooks” syndrome is probably a factor too), I have to rate it just OK, no more. I’d rate it a bit higher for first time watchers, but for rewatching after a few years I’d say Mr & Mrs Smith (2005) is just OK.

Salt (2010) – Angelina Jolie

Salt is an action packed mystery thriller with plot twists galore. It’s got a simple plot really, but it twists and turns regularly to keep things interesting. It’s got some great action and some great intrigue, but it’s also got a significant dose of gritty political drama which limits its value for those who prefer smooth action hero movies without the gritty drama.

Angelina Jolie does great as a triple agent who was trained as a Russian spy to be a double agent in the American CIA, only to trick her Russian comrades and save the world. The main supporting cast members also do great, including Chitwetel Ejiofor (the black guy from Doctor Strange, 2016) who plays her boss at her CIA, and Liev Schreiber (Logan’s evil doppelganger from X-Men Origins: Wolverine, 2009) who plays a legit double agent only revealed towards the end. Plot twists aplenty!

All in all, with its simple but twisting plot, a few strong actors, decent budget & effects, and its mood regularly fluctuating between thrilling and unpleasant, I rate this movie as just OK, which is a respectable rating – all the movies I’ve rated OK provide a fair level of entertainment – they’re more than just watchable. But as tempted as I am to rate it Decent, I can’t because there’s something missing. There’s a lack of soul & spirit to this movie. It’s all very cold and intermittently depressing, and it could certainly benefit from a more advanced plot, script and cast. Angie’s also getting on a bit in this movie – she’s in her mid 30s here, which isn’t a big deal, but she’s not in her prime any more.

Hacking

Hackers (1995) – Jonny Lee Miller and Angelina Jolie

This was a classic in its day and is still a pretty good movie today. The core plot is simple but the script contains many cool features that are still fun to watch three decades later.

This movie follows the fictional story of a young hacker called Dade Murphy – alias Zero Cool aka Crash Override – played by Jonny Lee Miller. He moves with his mother to New York, and meets other hackers there including Kate Libby – alias Acid Burn – played by Angelina Jolie. They have fun, compete with each other, and uncover a malicious plot by the head of security for a large corporation – initially the hackers are blamed, but eventually they vindicate themselves and are recognised as heroes.

There are no physical martial arts in this movie, but there are plenty of tactical concepts demonstrated. There’s plenty of computer hacking going on, plus social engineering, building infiltration, police evasion, etc. Of course it’s not totally legit, it’s just a dramatised depiction for the big screen, but some of the ideas & tactics portrayed here hold true.

Shortly after 50 mins in, is when it turns from a barely OK movie into a pretty good movie, as Dade gets closer to Kate and they agree to a friendly competition.

Fun Fact 1: When this movie was released, MGM made a website to help promote it, and that website allegedly got hacked and defaced. MGM decided to leave the defaced version up throughout the time this movie was shown in cinemas. During the hack, some words were changed in an attempt to light-heartedly mock the movie – nothing terribly offensive or shocking was said or shown. So was it really hacked or was this just a promotional stunt? The media says it was a legit hack, but I suspect it wasn’t.

Fun Fact 2: Jonny Lee Miller (who plays Dade Murphy) and Angelina Jolie (who plays Kate Libby) got married the year after this movie was released. This confirms their on-screen chemistry was real, although their marriage only lasted 18 months. Angelina went on to marry Billy Bob Thornton in the year 2000 – that’s 1 year after the movie they worked on together (called Pushing Tin) was released. Their marriage lasted 3 years. Incidentally, Thornton has married a total of 6 different women in his lifetime! Then Angelina went on to marry Brad Pitt from 2014 till 2019, but was dating him since they co-starred in Mr & Mrs Smith in 2005, which was when he divorced Jennifer Aniston. So Angelina has a strong track record of dating if not marrying her co-stars, and Jonny Lee Miller was her first marriage. She was aged 20 and he was turning 23 when Hackers premiered on 15 September 1995 in America.

Hackers (1995) starring Angelina Jolie and Jonny Lee Miller

Assassins Training

Wanted (2008) – James McAvoy and Angelina Jolie

As the plot goes, there are certain nerdy people born with extra sensitivity, who think they’re prone to panic attacks. But if they recognise, appreciate and tap into this hyper-sensitivity, they can become abnormally skilled movers with supernatural reflexes and calculation capabilities. Kind of like Rain Man (with Autism) meets Limitness (on NZT).

I’m not a fan of the mentality pushed early on in this movie, that it’s somehow a good thing, and a superior thing, to be a killer. But to its credit, this mentality kind of gets dispelled later on.

Action wise, it’s pretty strong from the outset. There’s Matrix-style diving through windows in bullet time, and there’s spinning bullets round corners like Beckham bends footballs. Plus there’s a few high-budget high-speed car chases. This is a fast action movie, intermittently. It has many story-setting slow drama scenes too, but fortunately they usually don’t drag on too long.

James McAvoy takes the lead role in this movie. He does a fair enough job. Not the typical macho action hero, but that’s not the vibe this movie was going for. Not to everyone’s taste, but it kind of works OK.

Angelina Jolie (in her early 30s) plays the lead female in this movie. She’s the main selling point of this movie, considering her fame since Lara Croft: Tomb Raider (2001) where she became a household name and soon went on to hook up with Brad Pitt on the set of Mr & Mrs Smith (2005), although she was also in some strong movies in the 90s such as Hackers (1995) where she played the lead female, although she looked a bit different there.

Morgan Freeman plays a major supporting role, in a Morpheus-like position, as the head of the cult of assassins.

Chris Pratt plays a minor supporting role early on in this movie, as a colleague of the lead character. He’s best known to action hero movie fans as the star of the Guardians Of The Galaxy movies. He looks a bit different in Wanted though. Fun fact: he’s been married to Arnie’s daughter, Katherine Schwarzenegger, since 2019.

Overall, I rate this movie as Pretty Good, alongside the likes of Wonder Woman and Ghost In The Shell. The reason I don’t rate it even higher, on a par with movies like Hitman, The Equalizer and The Transporter, is because the lead male character isn’t totally my cup of tea. He’s a bit of a beta-male. Plus, the script has a few too many moments of intentional distastefulness for my liking. It’s a shame, because the goodness in the plot, and many exciting moments in this movie, are worthy of a higher rating; but I guess every Pretty Good movie has some relatively outstanding moments.

Great plot twist half an hour before the end, to keep things very interesting, just when it seemed like the plot was starting to run stale. Great ending too. It’s rare to see an action movie whose creativity and entertainment value doesn’t dwindle towards the end.

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