Nikita (1990)
Country: FR/IT
Technical: Eastmancolor/scope 117m
Director: Luc Besson
Cast: Anne Parillaud, Jean-Hugues Anglade, Tchéky Karyo, Jeanne Moreau, Jean Reno
Synopsis:
A young female delinquent sentenced for killing three police officers is trained by security services to be a state assassin.
Review:
The epitome of nineties designer violence (France being ahead of the game, the film brought a raft of imitations from Hollywood, not least a dire remake, Assassin). The film is a semiotician's dream, posing all sorts of questions before contradicting them; questions about women playing men's games and beating them, women being brutalised, the tomboy child being turned into a woman, only a lethal one. The fact that it does so with so much style and conciseness to some extent excuses the lack of clarity and descent into violence for its own sake. Quite un-French in its supremacy of image over word, it is nonetheless very much a national product in its lack of closure; to put it another way, 'cinéma du look'.
Country: FR/IT
Technical: Eastmancolor/scope 117m
Director: Luc Besson
Cast: Anne Parillaud, Jean-Hugues Anglade, Tchéky Karyo, Jeanne Moreau, Jean Reno
Synopsis:
A young female delinquent sentenced for killing three police officers is trained by security services to be a state assassin.
Review:
The epitome of nineties designer violence (France being ahead of the game, the film brought a raft of imitations from Hollywood, not least a dire remake, Assassin). The film is a semiotician's dream, posing all sorts of questions before contradicting them; questions about women playing men's games and beating them, women being brutalised, the tomboy child being turned into a woman, only a lethal one. The fact that it does so with so much style and conciseness to some extent excuses the lack of clarity and descent into violence for its own sake. Quite un-French in its supremacy of image over word, it is nonetheless very much a national product in its lack of closure; to put it another way, 'cinéma du look'.
Country: FR/IT
Technical: Eastmancolor/scope 117m
Director: Luc Besson
Cast: Anne Parillaud, Jean-Hugues Anglade, Tchéky Karyo, Jeanne Moreau, Jean Reno
Synopsis:
A young female delinquent sentenced for killing three police officers is trained by security services to be a state assassin.
Review:
The epitome of nineties designer violence (France being ahead of the game, the film brought a raft of imitations from Hollywood, not least a dire remake, Assassin). The film is a semiotician's dream, posing all sorts of questions before contradicting them; questions about women playing men's games and beating them, women being brutalised, the tomboy child being turned into a woman, only a lethal one. The fact that it does so with so much style and conciseness to some extent excuses the lack of clarity and descent into violence for its own sake. Quite un-French in its supremacy of image over word, it is nonetheless very much a national product in its lack of closure; to put it another way, 'cinéma du look'.