David Harbour

Review – Black Widow (2021) Run Time: 2hrs 14mins Directed by: Cate Shortland Produced by: Kevin Feige Written by: Eric Pearson, Jac Schaeffer & Ned Benson Starring: Scarlet Johansen, Florence Pugh, David Harbour and Rachel Wei Release Date: July 8th 2021 Prduction company: Marvel Studios Introduction So, after countless delays from a certain world-changing event in 2020, (No not the Snap the other one) ‘Black Widow’ was finally released to a fairly positive public reception reportedly making $158 million at the global box office and earning $60 million on Disney Plus worldwide. However, although it has made bank at the box office and broke records, critical success does not always indicate fan praise. So, the real question is, ‘Is this a Good Film?’ Or is it too little too late for everyone’s favourite Russian Super-Spy? In this review, I am going to break down what I believe to be some of the key points of the film, which means and say it with me now, Spoilers ahead! Black Widow: Opening Well, I’ll be completely honest, yes this is a great film. Is it perfect, Well no, very few films are in the eyes of the ravenous Marvel fandom. Now before you go clicking off this review to go back to scrolling through social media, let me tell you why this is one of the best Solo MCU outings in recent years, despite some of its flaws. ‘Black Widow’ starts in 1995 where we see a happy family in a suburban neighbourhood in Ohio. All is not as it seems however as it turns out that the family are a Soviet sleeper cell comprised of The Red Guardian, Alexei Shostakov (David Harbour), Melina Vostokoff (Rachel Weisz), and their surrogate daughters Natasha Romanoff (Scarlett Johansson/Ever Gabo Anderson) and Yelena Belova (Florence Pugh/Violet McGraw). When their mission to steal S.H.I.E.L.D. intel is complete, the family escapes to Cuba and rendezvous with their boss, General Dreykov (Ray Winston), who has Romanoff and Belova taken to the Red Room for training. This is where we get a phenomenal opening sequence set to a haunting cover of Nirvana’s ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’ that splices through the events of Natasha life after being taken to the Red Room, showing her involvement in several recent Political events and how prominent Ray Winstons, General Dreykov has been in recent history, being pictured with a bunch of world leaders through the years. This opening sequence allows the viewer to understand how Natasha was manipulated into, committing several war crimes and how many of the other ‘Widows’ were also by extension trafficked and controlled showing a very poignant look at the idea of modern slavery. This is also a great touch by Marvel to acknowledge that Black Widow was a cold-blooded Killer with plenty of Red in her ledger before redeeming herself into a hero, which is one of the key themes in the film. From this point, we fast forward to 2016, just after the events of Civil War where Natasha finds herself on the run from the US government going into hiding from General Thunderbolt Ross (William Hurt). Meanwhile, Yelena is currently still a Black Widow, being controlled by Nanites and being forced to hunt down those who are attempting to, Spoiler, Break all the ‘Widows’ free from their programming. This is one of the first flaws the film has in my opinion as although Yelena has red in her ledger as a ‘Widow’ due to her being controlled with nanites against her will it feels slightly less impactful than Natasha’s ‘earned’ red, that came because of her consciously making the choice to commit murder as a Black Widow. Yelena is then broken out of her programming by her target being sprayed in the face by an antidote to her mind control, leading to a heartbreakingly amazingly acted scene by Florence Pugh shown through her facial expressions and physical acting. Black Widow: Family Matters The characters in this film are all honestly endearing and charming, with the idea of them being one big family unit, emphasising a lot of the humorous moments to great effect. The dynamic of Scarlet Johansson, Florence Pugh, David Harbour, and Rachel Weisz as a dysfunctional family is fantastic as Pugh and Harbour especially show off their comedic chops to cut through some of the darker subjects in the film. Pugh especially uses her humour to darkly poke fun at how as a ‘Widow’ she cannot have children due to having a forced hysterectomy which is surprisingly dark for an MCU film. In terms of acting ability, each individual shines through with some convincing Russian accents from Harbour and Weisz with Pugh especially knocking it out of the park with her accent. The only person who fails to nail the voice is Ray Winston who due to his native cockney accent does sound like a cartoonish bond villain, which although not great does actually serve to emphasise his innate cheesiness as this looming figure with over-amplified Russian Traits. Black Widow: The Villains As the film progresses, we are slowly introduced to more characters in Natasha’s life as well as events in her past including the infamous Budapest event mentioned by Nathasha and Hawkeye all the way back in the first Avengers film. This event plays a key part in this film as well, as it turns out to defect to S.H.I.E.L.D Natasha had to assassinate General Dreykov, however, she caught Dreykov’s Daughter as Collateral Damage in the crossfire, an act that haunts her through the film. It turns out however neither Dreykov nor his daughter were killed and in turn are the main antagonists for the film with Dreykov planning on releasing thousands of Nanite brainwashed ‘Widows’ onto the planet tapping into what he describes as “A natural resource the world has too much of.” Girls. Although this feels like a slightly heavy-handed metaphor for ‘Girl Power’ and female empowerment, this illustrates a juxtaposition of the ideas of Women being treated like garbage for