"Salt" Review

It's a movie we didn't really cover much on AtD, and what a shame it is. The movie is Salt, and stars the always lovely Angelina Jolie in a not-so-lovely role. A bit of history for you: the movie was not intended for Jolie. Fact is, it was never intended for a woman, period. The movie was written with a male lead, (rumor was Tom Cruise was set to star). Producers talked to Jolie, fell in love with the idea of converting the lead to a female and here we are today reviewing the movie. Let's go.


What I liked about the movie:
Angelina Jolie

This may come as an obvious positive in my review, but let me tell you why it's not so obvious. There aren't very many movies with female leads. There are even less action movies with female leads. So Jolie had to make it count, and boy does she make it count. Without giving anything way, we spend the entire movie trying to figure out, is Salt who she says she is? Or is she a spy, the way she's accused in the trailer?

Where does Jolie succeed the most? When she's acting alone. Anyone will tell you this is extremely difficult. To carry a scene without dialogue, alone, is a difficult feat. Similar to Tom Hanks in Cast Away, Jolie must command the audience's attention without much to work with. She pulls it off. Her expressions, her thought process, everything came through in the performance.

The Action

It's hard to fool fans these days. I've been watching movies on a daily basis for 25 years, I'm bound to see repeat stunts in action films. But Salt has stuff we've never seen before, at least not like this. The stunts are practical, which means they were actually performed, not added by a computer later. There is one particular scene where Salt has to jump from car to car on the freeway. The scenario itself may not be new to us, but the execution is. The cameraman actually takes the leap WITH Salt during one of the jumps. Awesome! The rest of the action is great hand-to-hand combat reminiscent of the Bourne trilogy. Good stuff.

The Story/Writing
This was a pleasant surprise. Usually this genre just pumps out the same ol' story lines time and time again. Salt does a good job of keeping the spy storyline fresh and different from movies in the past. The surprise twist at the end got me, and I've seen literally hundreds of action movies; I didn't see that one coming.


What I didn't like about the movie:
Sub-Plot
This is actually been a problem in several movies I've seen lately. Sub-plots are a tricky thing to deal with. They can't take over the entire movie, but have to be interesting enough to matter. I don't feel as though the sub-plot worked in the movie. It deals with the Salt character and her husband; how they met, how they fell in love, etc. This is all done through flashbacks. Once we reach the end of the film, we quickly learn none of the sub-plot matter. Don't worry, no spoiler was just given to you.

Overacting

I hate to put this in the review, but I had to. I know it's an action movie and "tough" cops are important and all, but damn you, Chiwetel Ejiofor, if you weren't trying too hard. He should have taken note from his co-star, the AWESOME Liev Schreiber. Schreiber had plenty of opportunities to over-act as Salt's best friend in the movie, but he doesn't! Sorry, I had to say something because I like Ejiofor in his other work.


Believe me, there wasn't much else I didn't like about the film. It was a solid summer action flick that satisfied the senses. My wife isn't much of an action buff, or a Jolie fan, and left smiling from ear to ear after the movie. This WILL be a franchise and I love where it's headed. The story is set up for a nice arc and I can't wait to see it play out. Salt was a great surprise and we here at AtD owe it an apology for not covering it more closely.

Why Angelina Jolie Is Turning Down "Wanted 2"

Wanted was a comic book movie adaptation that I really enjoyed. Angelina Jolie and James McAvoy were great in the film. The movie was profitable, so a sequel was inevitable right? Will everyone be coming back? The answer is no. Angelina Jolie will not be. Then there were rumors Kristen Stewart would be joining the sequel. Let's make sense of all of this.

[SPOILER ALERT]
Angelina Jolie's character, Fox, dies at the end of Wanted. So I thought this was always a stupid story. Why dig so deep to make her character come back to life or any of that stupid stuff. During a press junket for the upcoming spy thriller, Salt, Angelina Jolie sat down with comingsoon.net. She commented on the sequel, and her rejection of it.

Being dead makes it difficult. They were (trying to bring me back) but I kind of feel like if I die in a movie, I should die actually. I'm that way, and that character is not as complex as Salt. It would just be doing the exact same thing in another movie, so it's not that interesting to me.

[END SPOILER ALERT]

I already liked Angelina Jolie before this, now I like her even more. How refreshing is it to hear an actress or actor say, "I'm not just going to take the money, this has to make the most sense in the movie". I completely agree with Jolie's decision and think it's the right thing to do.

A few weeks ago I presented a way to make a sequel work for Jolie's character. How about a prequel? Kristen Stewart could show us the Fox's younger years and her inception into the fraternity. That would be pretty cool! We'll see what happens.

Quickie: Brand new 'Salt' trailer featuring Angelina, kickin' butt

We really haven't talked about this one much, but it looks good. The movie is Salt, and it stars Angelina Jolie. She's no stranger to kick ass action movies, and this one looks promising. But I have to be honest, the whole "being set up", then spending the rest of the movie proving your innocent has been done before, A LOT. We'll have to wait for the finished product to see if it's any good. Enjoy the trailer.