Kate Review

I'm sure on paper, a film like Netflix's "Kate" sounded like a fantastic idea. Take the basic premise of "Crank," a poisoned assassin looking for revenge and mix in the neon-soaked choreography of "John Wick," topped off with a gender-swap lead- it's no wonder that the idea could attach top talent like usually wonderful Mary Elizabeth Winstead as the lead and a supporting cased including Woody Harrelson and Tadanobu Asano. Yet the end result is a visual candy that leaves you hungry for substance once it's all over. Good thing I love candy, but the problem here is that this is not very good candy.

Mary plays the title Kate, who's exposed to high levels of radiation between missions, and well, that's it, that's the plot. Harrelson plays Varrick, her mentor, a most thankless role that consists of him sitting down, standing up, and I think one time he got out of a car. A character like that in a movie like this can only be one of two things: A) a good guy or B) a bad guy. And here, the script doesn't even try to hide which one he really is.

The film takes place in Japan for an excuse to have brightly colored lights and a few subtitled conversations, mostly in the form of family drama between the men behind her contamination, and some cheap gags about cats.

Her mission takes a detour once the supposed villain's niece Ani, played by Miku Martineau, who's initially used as bait but soon forms a sorta sweet relationship with our heroine. The script gives neither much to work with, with only small pieces of backstory that feel pillaged from other movies. Yet their performances won me over thanks to a spark of chemistry between the duo. Both are talented actresses, and both deserve a better production to showcase them.

That unfortunately doesn't save "Kate" from sinking to the depths of the Netflix backlog; so much of the film is resolved through violence, which is fine by me, but only if there's some personality to it. The gunfights are lazily staged, filled with slow-mo for no reason outside trying to look "cool." The hand-to-hand combat fares better, with a rhythmic pacing that is filmed in a clean, clear way so that you can actually tell who's punching who, but what does it matter? It lacks the sense of humor of "Nobody" and the brutal efficiency of something like "John Wick 3." Oh, she shoved a knife through random henchman #3's jaw? Neat, I guess, but remember when in the latter Keanu Reeves killed a man by shoving a book in his mouth? Now that's cool.

But then again, from the safety of your own house, you can stream a diet vengeance flick that'll keep you distracted for an afternoon. Covid-be-damned, we want our violence, and we want it slick, professionally made, and by golly we want it disposable!