Beware! Charlie's Angels in town and can kick your butts
By Joko EH Anwar
Charlie's Angels; Action, 90 minutes; Starring: Drew Barrymore, Cameron Diaz, Lucy Liu, Bill Murray; Directed by McG; A Columbia Pictures Presentation
JAKARTA (JP): Three sexy, smart, independent women fight bad guys by using high-flying kicks and karate chops and perform other stunts, including jumping out of a flying airplane, in a nonstop action film. Mindless? Maybe. Tongue-in-cheek? Sure. Entertaining? Definitely.
It seems that filmmakers are dredging up the many defunct television series to turn into feature-length movies. They are taking advantage of people's nostalgia of old beloved TV series in hopes of attracting them to see the big screen adaptations at theaters.
Some turn out great, such as The Fugitive (1996) which stars Harrison Ford as a doctor running away after he is suspected of killing his wife, while some are mediocre, including The Saint (1996). Some have ended up as a disgrace to the series, such as the embarrassing, unforgivably disastrous The Avengers (1998).
This time, the long-lived TV series Charlie's Angels which ran from 1976 to 1981, has been turned into a hi-tech action-packed film and luckily, this adaptation falls into the first category.
The former TV angels were played by the fabulous female stars Farrah Fawcett-Majors, Jaclyn Smith and Kate Jackson. The shows portrayed ridiculous but revolutionary female characters on television, mixing cheesiness with radical ideas and succeeded to become one of the most memorable TV series in history.
In the original, each of the angels had a specialty; martial arts, guns or knives, which they combined to catch the bad guys.
This time, the angels depend on their martial skills only, no guns. But that is more than OK since, surprisingly, the three actresses who play the title characters can do the high-kicking scenes well, with the help of many cinematic tricks.
These leg-kicking, belly-shaking, breast-heaving angels also don many disguises from Japanese geishas to a flirtatious, yodeling telegram trio of German maidens in lederhosen.
Charlie's Angels is the best yet from among the earlier disappointing film adaptions this year, such as Mission:Impossible 2 (MI:2) and the overpraised The X-men.
MI:2 is too mindless when it should have been more brainy, while The X-Men tried to be too serious and scientific when they should have added more action scenes. But Charlie's Angels always keeps its tongue firmly in cheek, never takes itself too seriously and ends up being faithful to the original series.
Unlike those films which have all the action scenes covered in their trailers, Charlie's Angels has so many exciting scenes even the trailers do not have time to show them all.
The angels kick even more action than MI:2, which was directed by the king of action from Hong Kong, John Woo.
Hollywood seems to have stolen the great Hong Kong fighting techniques in films (witness The Matrix, Lethal Weapon 4, Romeo Must Die) with the help of imported Hong Kong experts from the fighting instructors to the actors.
Charlie's Angels' fighting scenes were guided by martial arts expert Cheung-Yan Yuen and his team who trained the cast six to eight hours a day. It was worth it.
The angels bash, twirl, leap and kick everyone's backside.
The story is secondary in the film but the exciting action will help you forgive the poor plot.
Knox Technologies president Vivian Wood (Kelly Lynch) hires the female private detectives from the Townsend Detective Agency, owned by the never visible billionaire Charlie Townsend, to investigate the kidnapping of her associate, Eric Knox, the founder of the company.
Vivian tells the private detectives that Knox's rival Roger Corwin is ambitious about obtaining Knox's latest sophisticated technology to complete his own device which can locate anyone on the planet by tracing their voices on the telephone.
So the angels played by Cameron Diaz, Drew Barrymore, and Lucy Liu, soon get into action.
Even with not-too-intelligent dialogs the angels are radiant and overshadow other characters in the film. Even the usually funny Tom Green, who plays Chad, seems to try hard for attention but fails. Bosley's character, who is played by first-rate comedian Bill Murray, is also forgettable.
The angels, however, are the real winners in the film.
Cameron Diaz, who plays Natalie, has captured the hearts of critics and film audiences with her roles in comedies and dramas such as the great There's Something About Mary and her role in the highly acclaimed Being John Malkovich in which she stars opposite John Cusack and John Malkovich.
In every film she stars in, Diaz radiates with intelligence, wit and beauty, even with the oversized wig in Being John Malkovich).
Playing Dylan is Drew Barrymore, a successful child actress after her roles in E.T. The Extraterrestrial and Firestarter, was once a drug addict and an alcoholic. Unlike many child actors and actresses who have faded away, such as Macaulay Culkin and Linda Blair, Barrymore got back on her feet and even established Flower Films, a film company which she established with a partner.
Barrymore is one of the producers of Charlie's Angels.
She has become a dedicated philanthropist and supporter of animal and children's rights.
The principal cast seems to have much fun playing their ridiculous characters, showing self-mockery and triumphantly avoiding to be objects of screen exploitation.
This is just how mindless films should be: highly entertaining.
All right now, let us have the sequel.