“You shouldn’t think of her as a woman. That would be a mistake.”
Criticize director Steven Soderbergh all you want for casting someone who isn’t an actual actor to lead a star rich action film, but director Steven Soderbergh accomplishes something studios are often too narrow minded to try. He casts a woman who is brawn, beauty, and brains all in one. While Hollywood and directors have a fetish for casting wafer thin women who look as if they can barely hold a pencil let alone a machine gun (I’m looking at you Milla Jovovich), star Gina Carano is a woman who is built like a fighter in every sense of the word and approaches every single brilliantly staged fight scene with competence and believability, because there’s no doubting a woman of her presence can handle a man two times her size.
Gina Carano is a newcomer to the world of action cinema, but she’s destined to be one of the few great female action stars if she continues down a path independent from Hollywood who are more obsessed with sexualizing their female heroes rather than transforming them in to warriors. Gina Carano manages to display swift blows and quick thinking as well as masterful kicks to the guts of her enemies while retaining a sensuality that is just bold and absolutely irresistible. She possesses a rare beauty rarely found in cinema that is untouched and unaltered and I truly hope she remains that way. Her breed of female action star is dying, and with enough of a boost, Carano can revive the model of a woman who can be strong and sexy without sacrificing her dignity. Star Carano is given a lot of dialogue and scenes to carry and Soderbergh’s confidence in her really creeps in to what is best summed up as a clever and exciting action film that displays a bold female heroine who can roll with the boys, and still look damn good sauntering around in a bath robe.
Soderbergh knows perfectly well how and when to depict Carano’s character Mallory Kane as a sexual being and as a warrior, and Carano inhabits both dimensions perfectly throughout her story where character Mallory Kane becomes the fall woman for a conglomerate of male government agents who peg her for a patsy in a double crossing that ultimately was supposed to end with Kane dead. With Mallory Kane on the run, she spends most of the film trying to figure out how and why she was framed, and fights for survival rather than trying to prove her innocence. Soderbergh stages much of the action scenes and chase sequences with radical camera angles allowing an individual and novel feel to the action and tension that ensues. There are rarely quick edits, or fast cuts as Soderbergh zeroes in on the battles Kane wages with her foes, inducing the suspense in her fight for survival among these powerful politicians and agents. There’s even an entire car chase that ensues backward with the camera pointed straight at Carano, while the opening features a surprise battle in the middle of a restaurant that just hooks audiences in.
Most of the film’s narrative is reliant on piecing together the clues of Mallory Kane’s attempted assassination, and Soderbergh hands the film over constantly to a slew of excellent actors like Ewan McGregor, Michael Douglas, Michael Fassbender, and Antonio Banderas to name a few. They spend most of the film trying to figure out who is the traitor, who is working with Mallory, and who should help her in her quest. Mallory Kane is a woman who inhabits a world run by men, but never allows herself to be ruled by them. Even when turning to her survivalist war veteran father (Bill Paxton in a welcome restrained supporting role), she never weeps or begs for shelter. She assesses her environment and instructs him how to deal with the crooked agents almost guaranteed to enter his home and transform Mallory in to a terrorist.
I really wish action cinema had more powerful female heroines running the show in these films, and I truly hope Soderbergh begins a trend because women like Gina Carano could truly alter how Hollywood and pop culture as a whole view the opposite sex. “Haywire” is a clever and truly excellent action thriller, and Gina Carano is a welcomed addition to the pantheon of action stars. Featured in the Blu-Ray is the sixteen minute Gina Carano in Training with interviews with the MMA fighter, as well as a five minute segment called The Men of Haywire with interviews featuring Michael Fassbender, Ewan McGregor, Channing Tatum, and Antonio Banderas. “Haywire” features a rare breed of action hero with a director who chooses to depict his female heroine with dignity and enough strength to bring down anyone and everyone around her without sacrificing her sexuality or charisma. Gina Carano is a welcome contender to the action genre, and “Haywire” is a suitable fixture for fans of heist films, and action cinema.