THE FOLLOWING REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS OF THE DISCUSSED FILM. READERS DISCRETION IS ADVISED.
Everyone I knew had one movie they watched before the COVID-19 pandemic temporarily shut down theaters. For me, my answer was the DCEU film, Birds of Prey (and the Fantabulous Emancipation of one Harley Quinn).
PLOT
The film follows Harleen Quinzel aka Harley Quinn, who has broken up with the Joker for good. When he kicks her out of his home, she lives under the rent of Taiwanese restaurant owner Doc (Dana Lee) and owns a hyena, naming it after Bruce Wayne. Whoever she shares this to do not believe it because of how she appeared dependent toward the Clown Prince of Crime. In between a series of binge drinking at a nightclub owned by crime lord Roman Sionis/Black Mask, she is almost sexually assaulted by a stranger but is saved by nightclub singer Dinah Laurel Lance/Black Canary, who has a secret power to summon an ultrasonic scream. Sionis recruits Lance as his new driver when taking notice of the conflict. Sionis sends her and his right hand man Victor Zsasz to obtain the ‘Bertinelli Diamond’, a 3K diamond that has codes of foreign bank accounts that belong to the Bertinelli family. With it, he will become Gotham City’s foremost gangster. This opportunity is delayed when it’s stolen by orphaned pick pocket Cassandra Cain. Noticing the teenager getting arrested by local officers, she warns Detective Renee Montoya, someone who knew her mother on the force and is building a case towards Sionis. Harley publicly announces her breakup by destroying Ace Chemicals. Roman does prefer killing her for the many times she wronged him during her time with Joker. He gives her a chance to save herself by bringing in Cain until midnight. Not trusting her, he chooses to place a bounty on the girl. Quinn does break her out of a holding cell, only after fighting her way through officers and those who want the bounty. When she demands for the diamond, Cain admits to have swallow it as she got detained. Rather than killing her, she has her take laxatives in order to get to diamond out of her. When she gets sold out by Doc that results in her apartment getting destroyed, she makes one last deal with Sionis: If she hands Cain over to him, she wants full protection. They agree to meet at the abandoned funhouse 'The Booby Trap' for the exchange. Sionis orders Zsasz and Lance to go. Lance tips Montoya of the rendezvous, but gets caught by Zsasz. As Harley gets there first, she waits for the laxatives to kick in for Cain, Montoya shows up and tries to free the girl but Quinn knocks her out of the building. When Zsasz and Lance show up, Zsasz demands the latter to prove her loyalty by killing the girl. This is stopped by the crossbow wielding vigilante Helena Bertinelli/Huntress, the remaining survivor of her family who was murdered by Stefano Galante (Robert Catrini). Zsasz was the last person she needed to kill to avenge her family. When Montoya returns and recognizes her, she explains that Sionis hired Galante to kill her family to get the diamond. Just as that is said, Black Mask arrives with an army of thugs. All the women decide to team up against him with whatever weapons they could find. They do well defending themselves from inside the building, but get overpowered as they get outside. When Montoya gets crazed and Cain gets taken, Lance summons the Canary Cry so that the rest of the goons are incapacitated and that Harley can chase Sionis down. When they crash near a pier, she continues to pursue him. Before he could kill her, Cain reveals to implant a grenade on him. Just as she pulls the ring and breaks from him, Harley throws him off before he dies from the explosion. By morning, the women celebrate their victory by eating out. Montoya apologizes to Quinn for underestimating her. Cain finally uses the bathroom to get the diamond out of her body. After she relieves herself, she and Harley ditch the other women by taking Lance's car. Some time after this, Montoya would resign from GCPD when not receiving credit for taking down Black Mask. She would form the 'Birds of Prey' team with Lance & Bertinelli after the latter retrieves her wealth from the diamond. Harley would than pawn it to start her own business as a mercenary, with Cain as an accomplice. After reuniting with her pet hyena Bruce, since her apartment got attacked, the film ends with Harley enjoying an egg sandwich bought by Cain.
THOUGHTS
I had low expectations going into this film, due to not being entirely satisfied of 2016's Suicide Squad. Because of that, I ended up enjoying this more than I thought. Director Cathy Yan pulled off giving us such a fun film. The boldest thing about this film is how it's the first in the franchise to have an R rating as the predecessors originally led as PG-13. This was smart to do because this was a way to bring stronger investment towards adult viewers, besides teenagers. With that in mind, it definitely felt like there was more creativity with the action sequences throughout. From the prison break to the Booby Trap climax, all were fascinating to see due to being choreographed so well. I dig this film mainly due to Margot Robbie giving her best outing as Harley Quinn. In this perspective, she is literally on her own before forming the titular group. Without Joker, she is so vulnerable because she doesn't know what to do after spending a long time as an actual harlequin. She may have been fearless to take on the Enchantress, but she was never ready for a breakup. She never was because she hated being alone. However, it is through this journey here where she accepts that she never needed anyone to protected her because she proved to do that just fine without Joker. She also learns to lose herself, because that made her the person she is now. Because of this, she actually tries to be a better person than she ever was. She takes Cain under her wing because she's been in her shoes, knows what it's like to be abandoned by family. Seeing how well they bonded overtime, you can't help but be happy for them to be comfortable with their lives for the first time. It may be hard for some to forgive Harley due to her violent nature, but it's here where we know she has better morals now. Aside from the dramatic standpoint, she is pretty funny as well. From her unreliable narration, to being so calm and collective with her irrational decisions, to not hesitating with what she has to say is hysterical to behold. The entire gag of her craving of an egg sandwich remains the funniest part of the movie because it's so relatable. Quinn may be the star, but there were more characters here that gave a good impression. Never thought I'd see veteran actress Rosie Perez join the superhero party, but she fits right in. She gives a good performance as Renee Montoya, one who is all about extracting justice for Gotham, but she sadly works in a sexist environment. She busts her ass but doesn't get any promotion because her former partner gets the credit. She did the right thing quitting the department rather than transferring elsewhere, because she accepted that she didn't prove to anyone how good she is, as long as she knew. The funniest thing about her is how she would unintentionally sound like an 80s cop character and everyone picks on her when they notice it. I never heard of actress Jurnee Smollett-Bell ahead of film's release, making me nervous on how she'd do as Black Canary. Thankfully, she impressed me big time. As the said protagonist, she has a moral compass and remained empathic, but she was reluctant to step up because of the loss of her mother. She didn't trust authorities completely because that didn't work out for her but when hearing Montoya out, she accepted that not all cops suck. It took her a while to stand up to Black Mask because he took her in when no one else would. The more she saw his brutality firsthand, she knew he had to be stopped. I was surprised that the Canary Cry was only shown once, but it was cool when it happened. On top of that, Bell's singing is gorgeous to hear. Mary Elizabeth Winstead ain't there much as Huntress, but she still left her mark as well. She does a great job portraying her as an efficient assassin who has a hard time fitting in, due to her tragic backstory. She is necessarily ruthless on the field, but she does her best showing her soft side whenever she believes is comfortable to do so. Thankfully, she has new friends to help her along the way. Seeing this balance in a dramatic and comedic standpoint plays off very well. You're intimidated on how well she is with the crossbow, but you can't help laughing whenever she isn't taken serious, resulting in her getting upset. I was pretty annoyed that Cassandra Cain was portrayed as a pick pocket, rather than somewhat of a skilled martial artist that would foreshadow her time as Batgirl. Nevertheless, I do think Ella Jay Basco gives a solid performance on this interpretation. Because of her being an orphan, I understood where her free wheeling and fun loving nature comes from. And due to having zero guidance, she never took things serious until it was too late. Thankfully, her time with Harley put her in a better direction than she was before. Since she isn't in 2021's The Suicide Squad, it is a shame that we don't see if things between her and Quinn ended on good terms. Going into the villains, Ewan McGregor is at a whole other level as Black Mask. Rather than being a straight up tough crime lord, he is someone who acts psychotic due to his power hungry ambitions. Whenever something doesn't go his way, prepare the worst from him. Even he was unintentionally funny. Killing a girl over a snot bubble, criticizing his own mask collection, to dying in such shocking fashion, it's hard to have a straight face during all of that. And for Chris Messina, he is on point with making Victor Zsasz as much of a sadist as possible. The fact that this guy tallies his victims on his body comes to show that he's probably more psychotic than his own boss. I give this movie more credit than it's due but having said that, I can admit that there were a few things that bothered me. First off, how do other characters commonly know that Ace Chemicals was where Joker & Harley officially commenced their love? We know because we saw it happen in Suicide Squad, but is that really something either would brag about? I don’t think so. I did say the sandwich gag is funny but if Montoya knew Harley would be at that sandwich place, why didn’t she arrest her before she ever bought it? You’d be saving a sandwich if you done that. A weird thing I noticed is how ‘Roller Dummy’ (Keisha Tucker) saw Harley coming her way and was able to drop her air conditioner on time. I know a lot of people hate her, but someone had to tip her because I don’t believe she saw her. Black Canary has the new job of Black Mask’s driver because Harley injured the one before her, resulting in Montoya going to her as a new informant. My question is why trust her when you’ve never talked to her before until now? She wasn’t even trying to make her a deal, she was unwisely risking herself to win her over which could’ve gone bad. It probably would’ve been bound for Cain to steal the diamond from Zsasz, because she’d go for the pockets. I gotta admit that it’s technically Zsasz’s fault because he literally admired it in public. I mean that’s just asking for it to get taken from you. Also, why didn’t the cops search the girl before they put her in the car? Had they done that, they would’ve taken the diamond before she would ever consider swallowing it. And why would she a teenager be anywhere in the same area of cells near adult prisoners? Gotham is pretty fucked up for not separating teens and adults in this predicament. Another weird thing I noticed was how Harley stole a van from the evidence room, yet we don’t see an exit in that room. Did she break through a wall? Since she did sniff cocaine, I can believe that but it would be cool if we saw it though. Also, I don’t understand why didn’t Zsasz just kill the women immediately when he arrived at the Booby Trap. I don’t want to root for this guy, but he’d make his boss very happy if he just killed them and get done with it. And lastly, why did the Birds have a premature celebration when they knew damn well Black Mask and wasn’t dead yet? What made them think he was down for the count? They heard his voice before the fight begun, so that moment was pretty stupid. Ignore this stuff, and you'll still be enjoying this film for what it is. In conclusion, Birds of Prey arguably started 2020 on a high note for being a fun female led superhero film. If you have a soft spot for the first Suicide Squad film, check this out.
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