Hunter Melone
@HUNTER_MELONE
With incredible action sequences and a creative use of color presentation “Atomic Blonde” is easily one of the most visually stunning films to come out it in 2017.
Based on the graphic novel “ Atomic Blonde: The Coldest City” written by Antony Johnston, “Atomic Blonde” is an action thriller directed by David Leitch, the uncredited co-director of the ‘John Wick’ franchise and director of the highly anticipated “Deadpool 2”.
“Atomic Blonde” follows Lorraine Broughton, an undercover MI6 agent as she is sent to berlin during the cold war to recover a list of double agents. Lorraine’s hunt for the list intensifies as spies sent from other government organizations compete against each other to obtain the list. No one can be trusted and everyone’s true intentions are a mystery.
The most impressive aspect of “Atomic Blond”’ is the films’ visual presentation and world building elements.
With attention to detail in atmosphere and scenery, Leitch deserves recognition for bringing the look and feel of the graphic novel to life.
Every single one of the films’ scenes do a tremendous job at building a memorable world that feels rich with character.
Along with bright neon lights that glow against the films’ dark and bland colored scenery, “Atomic Blonde” takes full advantage of post production editing with some of the best use of tinted filters applied to film in modern cinema. The dark shades of blue and green filters perfectly blend with the gritty atmosphere in a way that doesn’t feel over the top and adds to the comic book feel that the film is trying to resemble.
With a director like David Leitch, the expectations for the fight scenes in ‘Atomic Blonde’ were set to high standards. Fortunately, Leitch doesn’t disappoint. “Atomic Blonde” delivers well choreographed fight scenes that are a joy to watch. No cheep camera angling or quick edits are used, this makes each fight seem believable and deeply satisfying to watch.The fight scenes are brutal, intense and incredibly engaging.
Despite the amazing fight scenes and visual presentation, everything else in “Atomic Blonde’ suffers from being mediocre to bad.
The film is horribly paced and overstays its welcome. The first half of the film progresses slowly and ultimately makes the movie feel longer than its two hour length and boring at times.
“Atomic Blonde’s” plot literally doesn’t progress at all until the last half of the film in which the story suddenly picks up to a study and sometimes overly fast pace. The inconsistent pace of storytelling really ruins the interesting plot to a degree that makes it hard to follow and ultimately difficult to even care about.
For example, there are some really clever and unpredictable plot twists thrown in the film that have no real effect or impact primarily because of how long they take to reveal.
Although “Atomic Blonde” is definitely rough around the edges, the films’ visuals, fight scenes and rich atmosphere alone makes the film enjoyable and unique. “Atomic Blonde” provides enough style and creativity to distinguish itself from other films in the spy genre earning it a rating of 7 out of 10 falcons.