A Heartless Fight

CAST: Gina Carano,Ewan McGregor,Michael Douglas,Antonio Banderas

Rating: **1/2

This is Soderbergh doing a Tarantino without the talk,a sort of Kill Bill in 93 minutes rather than three volumes,with a lot less blood and almost no heart. Soderbergh’s “Bride” is Mallory,played by Carano (a retired mixed martial arts expert in real life),who also finds herself in queerly tense situations. However,just when the strangeness hints at a different film,Haywire falls back on a jumbled conspiracy theory involving men with varying accents,nationalities and loyalties.

Soderbergh does keep Haywire moving at a breathtaking pace,even when all Mallory is doing is walking and then running. The fighting is hand combat,where Mallory begins by having coffee thrown on her face and being punched,and proceeds to pummel most of her enemies to death. Her anger is to be understood: she is the employee of a private contractor who hires trained agents like her to do government jobs,which governments won’t officially dirty their hands with,and she has been double-crossed and targeted to be killed,more than once.

Mallory gets back at each one of them — McGregor,Douglas,Banderas — who despite their individual potential are largely punching bags waiting around for their turn.

Soderbergh’s body of work has come to be characterised not only by the varied number of subjects he has tackled but also the way he has handled them. There have been big-budget successes as well as small-budget disappointments,films driven by dialogue,others by style. Haywire will be remembered for looking good,starting well,and not trying hard enough for anything more.