Black Widow

Finally, a Marvel movie for girls. The Avengers franchise has long devoted itself to uber-masculine superheroes with any stray females merely around for eye candy. Now the ladies are centre stage.

When Scarlet Johansson joined the Avengers crew as Black Widow in 2010, she was the obvious outsider among the superheroes. Johansson herself has criticised the “hypersexualisation” of her character who, at one point, is called a monster for not being able to conceive. Marvel movies since did little to correct the balance; superheroes don’t wear skirts, was the unmistakeable message.

So, in the post (hashtag)metoo era, a lot is riding on Black Widow, a movie devoted entirely to Johansson’s character. The credits had barely started rolling when the criticism started. Harper’s Bazaar claimed that Black Widow continued to perpetuate the idea that female characters aren’t capable of going it alone against a villain. The Guardian critic was taken to    task for being patronising in his review, alluding as it did to Johannson’s “sensuous cough-syrup purr” and her possible daddy issues. 

But what of the film itself? It starts in an Ohio suburb with Black Widow as 12 year old Natasha living with her little sister Yelena and parents Alexei (David Harbour) and Melina (Rachel Weisz). But we quickly discover that they are all Russian agents and unrelated to each other. They have to escape from the US and, back in Russia, the two girls are sent to the Red Room, where young girls train to be assassins.

Then it’s 21 years later and Natasha meets Yelena (Florence Pugh) in Budapest. Like all good fake-sister reunions it starts with a knockdown fight before the two join forces to rid the world of the Red Room, so that other young girls won’t have to suffer the misery they endured. The two head off to Russia to track down their former fake parents.

If there is a criticism of the film, it’s that Johansson’s character just isn’t as interesting as the other three. Fake Dad Alexei is comically arrogant and seems to believe he did a great job as a parent. Fake little sister Yelena gets some great one-liners teasing Natasha for flicking her hair all the time and assuming her “fighting pose”. Fake mother Melina, for whatever reason, keeps large numbers of pigs. It all makes for a very funny dysfunctional fake family reunion dinner.

The Red Room is run by Dreykov (Ray Winstone) who controls his charges by using mysterious red dust which robs them of their free will. He even utters the dastardly line that young women are “the only natural resource that the world has too much of”. Natasha and Yelena must take him on and, we learn, there’s history between him and Natasha.

The action isn’t quite as outlandish as a typical Avengers movie. Neither Natasha nor Yelena have superpowers but the fight choreography is excellent. 

Controversy aside, Black Widow has widely been praised as eminently watchable. It was directed by a woman (Cate Shortland) and stars three excellent female actors. A first for Marvel and, at least, a start in the right direction.