#Birds of prey harley quinn review movie#
#Birds of prey harley quinn review full#

Harley is acrobatic Montoya is a brass-knuckle brawler Huntress is a rage-fueled maniac. And they manage to make each character’s fighting and movement feel unique. It does rely too much on speed ramping, particularly when the more acrobatic, colorful Harley gets involved, but for the most part it uses the technique well, highlighting visually interesting shots instead of just prolonging the action.

#Birds of prey harley quinn review movie#

The action in this movie is surprisingly excellent, with strong fight choreography and inventive set-pieces. It doesn’t hurt that Robbie has ridiculous charisma, of course, but there’s more to her take than that. Harley Quinn should by all rights feel like the ultimate Manic Pixie Dream Girl, but Robbie’s excellent central performance keeps her grounded. Her romanticism peaks through, as does her background as a psychiatrist. Robbie’s Harley is someone who has gargantuan emotions and little self-control, but she also has a history. Margot Robbie isn’t playing the Timm/Dini Harley, hewing closer to the Palmiotti/Conner take, but unlike in Suicide Squad, she feels like an actual human being.

Which is fine, because she’s always bouncing off something - sometimes herself - but still: I need more Huntress immediately.Īs a Harley movie, though? It rocks. Mary Elizabeth Winstead has a deeply off-kilter manic quality that only gets better as she bounces off other members of the crew, but she rarely gets the chance. Perhaps the biggest disappointment in the film is how rarely its leads intersect.

#Birds of prey harley quinn review full#

Think of it like a backdoor pilot for a full Birds of Prey film, as Harley’s desperate bid for survival brings Montoya, Huntress, and Canary together. While the movie is called Birds of Prey, this is Harley’s story. All while someone is hunting down mob figures throughout Gotham with ruthless efficiency. Detective Renee Montoya (Rosie Perez) is on Quinn’s back, while Sionis’ lounge singer, Black Canary (Jurnee Smollett-Bell) is keeping an eye out for the girl. But she’s not the only person looking out for Cain. To get out from under there thumb, Quinn promises to help retrieve a diamond stolen by Cassandra Cain (Ella Jay Basco). Zsasz (Chris Messina), have enough pull in the city to really make things hard for her. And some of these lowlives, like gang boss Roman Sionis (Ewan McGregor) and his psycho henchman Mr.

When word gets out that Quinn and the Joker are no longer together, every low life who has it out for her comes knocking. Harley Quinn (Margot Robbie) is feeling a bit lost after a bad break-up with the Joker (not pictured). The cast is great, the action is clean, inventive, and mean, the design is tremendous.

And Margot Robbie is a tremendously talented actress, but was there really a huge clamoring for a return of her “Daddy’s Lil Monster” take on Harley Quinn? And aren’t we already on to a different, somehow equally shitty Joker now? We were tentatively excited for Birds of Prey here at ScreenRex, but now we’ve actually seen the thing.īirds of Prey shouldn’t work. It is stylistically (and, uh, actually) a sequel to Suicide Squad, which our own Kyle Pinion once called “a film so bad, it makes me long for the return of Zack Snyder to shelter us from the oncoming storm that is David Ayer’s Four Loko take on the DC Universe.” It’s directed by Cathy Yan, an indie filmmaker with a single feature credit to her name, a little-seen (but critically liked) dramedy called Dead Pigs.