By the end of its 2 hours and 20 minutes runtime, I was quite confused what to make of Francis Lawrence’s Red Sparrow. In terms of quality, just like the world of spycraft, it dwells in the gray in-betweens of good and bad. And like its titular sparrow, it’s calculated, violent, and, by the end of it all, still frustratingly when it comes to execution.
Red Sparrow couldn’t have come at a better time given the reemerging Cold War in today’s geopolitics. It takes place in Russia introducing us to ballerina-turned-spy Dominika Egorova (Jennifer Lawrence).
The world is cold, septic, and gray, yet we see the warmth seeping through Dominika’s life in her fledgling career as the star of Moscow’s famous Bolshoi Ballet company. It is with this job that she supports her ailing mother, that she keeps their bills at bay. Her bright future in the limelight is unexpectedly cut short after she suffers a debilitating injury. Through her uncle (Matthias Schoenaerts) working in government intelligence, Dominika is given the opportunity (if we can call it that) to earn the means to take care of her mother’s treatment once and for all. Plans go awry though, and Dominika soon finds her body the property of the Russian government, as she is trapped deeper and deeper into the oppressive world of espionage.
Red Sparrow works well in laying the groundwork. In its first half, Director Francis Lawrence shows calculated restraint in how he fleshes out its world, with its reveals. Like Katniss and her bow, he draws and then holds the tension, waiting for the right time to release — snapping audiences to their full attention.
Director Lawrence does this via a right mix of character ambiguity and well-placed action. Jennifer Lawrence’s Dominika is a character we can never quite get a clear read of. Between her determination as a ballerina and the oppression she suffers as a spy, it’s hard to determine if she is merely pushing herself to the limits in service of her country or she is planning an escape from their tight grasps.
This barrier between the character and the audience works well in building the film’s tension, but they remove well-needed nuance in fleshing out Dominika, especially when it comes to her subjection to sexual violence.
Red Sparrow is a film that revels in its R-rating. It delivers us sex and brutality previously unseen from the director. This may work well when it comes to the action as they are, admittedly, thrilling, violently visceral, and many times hard to watch. But for a topic as sensitive as sexual violence, the film could have benefited more if at least in this area they let Dominika’s walls down.
As in the world of Red Sparrow, sparrows are trained to dehumanize themselves so they can exploit the frailty of human desire in their opponents (in a “school” led by no one less than Charlotte Rampling!). As Dominika goes through her journey, she is raped, attempted to be raped, sexually humiliated in front of a crowd, brutalized, and tortured. Yet, all through this, we never see the inner workings of Dominika’s mind. She brushes this off and retaliates physically or through counter-humiliation.
This feels lacking as the approach, 1) feels too turn-based — they attack, she attacks — and 2) just furthers dehumanizes Dominika. I get that that’s the point of her whole character arc, her journey into the impersonal world of sexual espionage. But part of the film’s conceit is seeing the pushback of an outsider being forced into this world— the shock, the trauma. Instead, Red Sparrow banks on humanizing Dominika via her sick mother and the semblance of romance between her and CIA operative Nate Nash (Joel Edgerton).
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Red Sparrow peppers its film with these pieces that are supposed to set up Dominika’s big plan. Naturally, you would give the benefit of the doubt and wait for the reveal at the end. At the hands of a greater auteur, he or she would be able to tell their story while at the same time holding viewers’ interest in these pieces as they end up falling into place at the end — beautifully and giving catharsis.
Red Sparrow isn’t able to do that.
Red Sparrow doesn’t stick the landing as the twists and turn do nothing to build up the film’s finale. The revelation of the mole both sides have been after is anti-climactic and Dominika’s big move is more convoluted and novice rather than impressively intricate.
I haven’t read the book, though my friends that have said that the third act takes hefty liberties. Maybe Francis Lawrence and co. should have reconsidered the parts they replaced.
Don’t get me wrong, this might be the best film under Francis Lawrence’s filmography. This is also one of the actually impressive performances of Jennifer Lawrence (Lawrence, Lawrence, this is getting exhausting) as she is able to user her natural dollface to unnerve as the cold-blooded Dominika. But this semblance of greatness if any is offset by the bordering nonsensical latter half of the film.
TRIVIA: Did you know that Red Sparrow was supposed to be David Fincher and Rooney Mara’s re-teaming after The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo? What could have been?
