Review of Charlie's Angels (2019) by Davrosdaleks1 — 16 Nov 2019

This is not a perfect movies. It has its flaws. Still, I enjoyed myself. I found this to be a guilty pleasure. I mean, isn't "lightweight" or "guilty pleasure" what one should expect from a Charlie's Angels installment?

Let me get the script's problems out of the way. The story has its muddled plot points. There isn't a lot of regard for real world logic. Plus, there is one strange, dark element that leaves a bit of a metaphorical bitter aftertaste.

On the whole, I had a good time. Admittedly, it was in a brainless way. I felt there was a fair amount of funny lines and generally liked the combination of fight scenes and stylish locales. I also liked the decision that the Townsend Agency has been expanded into this larger multinational operation.

The three leads were good. Kristen Stewart was the MVP as the weird one who you can't predict what she'll say or do next. Naomi Scott also does a great job as the innocent newbie trying to stay afloat in the world of espionage she has found herself in. Ella Balinska is more of the straight woman and doesn't get as much a chance to shine, but she does a decent job when she gets to demonstrate her comedic chops.

What helps the film is that it has a surprisingly strong group of villains, most of them of which are also pretty funny.

As for the film's appearance: The movie has a pretty good selection of nice looking sets and locales. There were a couple ideas during fight scenes I thought were done well. The filming has some issues, particularly in the first half. There are way too many close-up shots. Also, there were a couple of times that the camera tried to balance the background and the foreground, which resulted in this brief but odd feel that's hard to put into words. It's sort of an uncanny valley-esque situation.

Overall, I kind of compare this to the first two films in that it doesn't matter that much what the film is about and just sitting back and enjoy the ride.