The scene is then set for some action-heavy hijinks as Collins takes out the bad guys almost single-handedly and saves the United States of America (and possibly the world) from its impending destruction. It’s a simple premise and one that we have seen variations of before but if you’re a fan of one person against the odds type movies with a female instead of a macho hunk in the lead, you will probably enjoy the movie. If you’re looking for something with brains as well as brawn, however, you are going to be disappointed. While this does touch on themes relating to sexual harassment and gender politics, debuting director Matthew Reilly tends to skirt over the seriousness of these topics in favour of hand-to-hand combat scenes and moments of athletic prowess as Pataky ably showcases her worth as an action star. Luke Bracy (Point Break) stars as the main villain of the piece, Alexander Kessel, and while he isn’t given a lot to work with in terms of dialogue and character motivation, he manages to exude the sliminess and wretchedness that we can expect from a B-movie bad guy. His reasons for wanting to cause mass destruction aren’t altogether clear but then again, the same can be said of the hundreds of other movie villains over the years who have wanted to annihilate the world for no particularly good reasons. We don’t really need to sympathise with them or their motivations because we want to see them get their ass kicked, and that’s exactly what happens here when Collins takes on Kessel and his team in a series of reasonably well-staged action sequences. It’s quite refreshing to see a female lead in a movie of this sort as it’s usually up to the men to save the world from crackpot terrorists and other assorted bad guys. Thankfully, Pataky is more than competent as an actress as well as a fighter, so unlike Steven Seagal, Chuck Norris, and Jean Claude Van Damme, she is able to give a reasonably believable performance as the military officer who has a terrible first day back at work after being on leave for an extended period. This isn’t to say she will win any awards for her turn here but she is still able to deliver her lines convincingly, as incredulous as they are, in between the scenes of her kicking some poor sap’s head in. Sadly, the storytelling is a bit of a jumble as it moves from the initial terrorist attack through to the utterly bizarre climactic standoff, and there is no plot logic to be found. The dialogue is dumb, clunky, and full of cliches and you could be forgiven if you thought the script was written back in the 90s, perhaps for somebody like the aforementioned Cynthia Rothrock who specialised in movies like this one. There’s nothing necessarily wrong with this if you’re not here for the story but the movie does come across as old-fashioned and stale as it goes through the motions. Ultimately, this isn’t really that good a movie but as it moves at a fairly brisk pace, it is still watchable. Despite the one location setting, the director manages to create some inventive action scenes, and there is a fun cameo from Chris Hemsworth (Pataky’s real-life husband) who manages to give this movie more credibility than it probably deserves. If you can forgive the narrative flaws and simply watch this for the ass-kicking, then you might gain some enjoyment from this. But if you’re looking for something with a believable plot line and characters who don’t look and sound like they have come from a 1990’s action flick, you might want to bypass this one and look elsewhere for your Friday night thrills. Read More: Interceptor Ending Explained
