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SFF: Heart of Stone
This popped up on Netflix, so I decided to watch it (because the preview was mildly entertaining, and I'm always down for "women who are spies and punch things").
And it was great - I won't say it's perfect or whatever, but it did a lot of things in the time it had, and I loved 99% of them (the 1% is the bit I wanted to punch someone for). I would seriously love a sequel, and there's total setup for it. I AM HERE FOR THIS, NETFLIX AND SUNDANCE.
The reasons: it was entertaining. Also, there were multiple female characters, who had conversations. ALSO, and this is something that still annoys the fuck out of me about most Action Women movies: a good 50% of the background characters were women. This was where The 355 fell down for me, because, yes, that movie had four (five?) women as a team, but every single person they encountered or walked past was a dude. Women didn't exist in that movie outside of them, and it made the movie terrible for me (aside from the laser focus on all the dudes, ugh, I'm getting off my soap box now).
Right. Heart of Stone (2023) stars Gal Gadot, Jamie Dornan, Sophie Okonedo, Matthias Schweighöfer, Paul Ready, Jing Lusi, and Alia Bhatt
There will be spoilers beneath the cut, but also for Person of Interest (seriously, if you've watched POI and you watch this, there are a couple of moments where you will cackle like hell, because, really? REALLY?)
Right, so.
The Machine from POI is now called The Heart, and it's helping run a super-secret org that tackles High Level shit, but sort of ignores everything else. And part of my 1% is how IN LOVE they were with their SF machine visuals (right down to copying POI-style Murderer Victim images, folks! I was like, "Wait, I've seen this before...."). BUT ANYWAY.
Said sekrit Org is called The Charter (ikr), and they run it as a four-section operation with 'suits' (guess, guess)
One of their operatives is inserted as the hacker/tech geek for a four-person MI-6 team (which includes Dornan, Ready, and Jing), and their op to capture and contain an arms dealer starts to go south when an unknown girl breaks in on their comms chatter, causing them to go to blackout conditions. And Stone (Gadot) has to keep her cover and rescue the mission.
If you love the stupid action shit that went down in a lot of the Brosnan Bond movies? You will fucking LOVE the opening sequence. It is honestly hilarious and amazing and fun, and I really loved it (I liked The World is Not Enough, folks, OF COURSE I LOVED THIS OPENING).
Right, so, shit goes down, and the team gets benched for a while and Stone gets raked over the coals for making friends with her team (who tease her about being a tech geek, and I was like, "OMG STONE IS THEIR MALCOLM" and then was sad for a bit, but then remembered Malcolm wouldn't be caught dead working for MI-6)
Stone's MI-6 team gets a lead on the hacker woman, and chase after her, landing themselves in an ambush. Stone breaks cover to save them and then gets betrayed.
The other part of the 1% is that as one of the dudes in Stone's life, whom she has been shown as ogling more than once, has a totally "in case you thought Stone was a lesbian, don't worry!" exchange where he says, as he's dying, "see you in the next life" and she replies "not if I see you first". SO UNNECESSARY. WHY. UGH.
Anyway, Stone gets reprimanded after being rescued and does the Lone Wolf thing where she goes off to Save the Day. And fails. And then sor of succeeds. And fails.
Stone meets the hacker woman face to face, her name is Keya, and she and Stone have some Very Intense Emotional moments, including Keya mocking her for being a violent child who got brainwashed by The Charter (which, to be fair...).
There's lots of action and Stone taking sooo much damage, but still going (seriously, if you love Die Hard for John Never Stopping... yeah, this is SO for you).
Oh, right, so Keya and her pals steal The Machine and install it in their own base, and then Keya discovers her pals just want to Murder Everyone, and a couple of people get murdered and Stone's handler and mentor get locked in a WWII bunker with the ventilators shut, and have like an hour to live.
And of course, Stone ends up saving the day. And is badass. And kills people (I appreciate that--OMG THE BIT WITH THE TRUCK. IT'S SO GOOD).
As you can tell, I really did like this one, and a large reason for that is that all of the women, even if they're brief flashes, feel like actual people. And the dudes, do, too. But NONE of the women is relegated to Girlfriend/Wife/Mother/Hostage (I mean, outside of the occasional moments), and they all have a part to play.
Stone also has a loooot of femslash potential with Nomad (her boss, Okonedo) and Yang, and Keya, too. And Six of Hearts who is there for two seconds, BUT.
So, yeah. If you liked Ocean's 8, James Bond, PoI, Ava, The 355, or similar things, you probably will enjoy this. Particularly the end. =D
And it was great - I won't say it's perfect or whatever, but it did a lot of things in the time it had, and I loved 99% of them (the 1% is the bit I wanted to punch someone for). I would seriously love a sequel, and there's total setup for it. I AM HERE FOR THIS, NETFLIX AND SUNDANCE.
The reasons: it was entertaining. Also, there were multiple female characters, who had conversations. ALSO, and this is something that still annoys the fuck out of me about most Action Women movies: a good 50% of the background characters were women. This was where The 355 fell down for me, because, yes, that movie had four (five?) women as a team, but every single person they encountered or walked past was a dude. Women didn't exist in that movie outside of them, and it made the movie terrible for me (aside from the laser focus on all the dudes, ugh, I'm getting off my soap box now).
Right. Heart of Stone (2023) stars Gal Gadot, Jamie Dornan, Sophie Okonedo, Matthias Schweighöfer, Paul Ready, Jing Lusi, and Alia Bhatt
There will be spoilers beneath the cut, but also for Person of Interest (seriously, if you've watched POI and you watch this, there are a couple of moments where you will cackle like hell, because, really? REALLY?)
Right, so.
The Machine from POI is now called The Heart, and it's helping run a super-secret org that tackles High Level shit, but sort of ignores everything else. And part of my 1% is how IN LOVE they were with their SF machine visuals (right down to copying POI-style Murderer Victim images, folks! I was like, "Wait, I've seen this before...."). BUT ANYWAY.
Said sekrit Org is called The Charter (ikr), and they run it as a four-section operation with 'suits' (guess, guess)
One of their operatives is inserted as the hacker/tech geek for a four-person MI-6 team (which includes Dornan, Ready, and Jing), and their op to capture and contain an arms dealer starts to go south when an unknown girl breaks in on their comms chatter, causing them to go to blackout conditions. And Stone (Gadot) has to keep her cover and rescue the mission.
If you love the stupid action shit that went down in a lot of the Brosnan Bond movies? You will fucking LOVE the opening sequence. It is honestly hilarious and amazing and fun, and I really loved it (I liked The World is Not Enough, folks, OF COURSE I LOVED THIS OPENING).
Right, so, shit goes down, and the team gets benched for a while and Stone gets raked over the coals for making friends with her team (who tease her about being a tech geek, and I was like, "OMG STONE IS THEIR MALCOLM" and then was sad for a bit, but then remembered Malcolm wouldn't be caught dead working for MI-6)
Stone's MI-6 team gets a lead on the hacker woman, and chase after her, landing themselves in an ambush. Stone breaks cover to save them and then gets betrayed.
The other part of the 1% is that as one of the dudes in Stone's life, whom she has been shown as ogling more than once, has a totally "in case you thought Stone was a lesbian, don't worry!" exchange where he says, as he's dying, "see you in the next life" and she replies "not if I see you first". SO UNNECESSARY. WHY. UGH.
Anyway, Stone gets reprimanded after being rescued and does the Lone Wolf thing where she goes off to Save the Day. And fails. And then sor of succeeds. And fails.
Stone meets the hacker woman face to face, her name is Keya, and she and Stone have some Very Intense Emotional moments, including Keya mocking her for being a violent child who got brainwashed by The Charter (which, to be fair...).
There's lots of action and Stone taking sooo much damage, but still going (seriously, if you love Die Hard for John Never Stopping... yeah, this is SO for you).
Oh, right, so Keya and her pals steal The Machine and install it in their own base, and then Keya discovers her pals just want to Murder Everyone, and a couple of people get murdered and Stone's handler and mentor get locked in a WWII bunker with the ventilators shut, and have like an hour to live.
And of course, Stone ends up saving the day. And is badass. And kills people (I appreciate that--OMG THE BIT WITH THE TRUCK. IT'S SO GOOD).
As you can tell, I really did like this one, and a large reason for that is that all of the women, even if they're brief flashes, feel like actual people. And the dudes, do, too. But NONE of the women is relegated to Girlfriend/Wife/Mother/Hostage (I mean, outside of the occasional moments), and they all have a part to play.
Stone also has a loooot of femslash potential with Nomad (her boss, Okonedo) and Yang, and Keya, too. And Six of Hearts who is there for two seconds, BUT.
So, yeah. If you liked Ocean's 8, James Bond, PoI, Ava, The 355, or similar things, you probably will enjoy this. Particularly the end. =D