Sony Pictures
The classic crime drama Charlie’s Angels debuted on ABC in 1976 and quickly became a hit, establishing Farrah Fawcett, Jaclyn Smith and Kate Jackson as bona fide stars. Fawcett left after the first season and Cheryl Ladd took over, with Shelley Hack and Tanya Roberts eventually brought in as replacements for their counterparts. Smith’s Kelly Garrett (‘Cover me, Kelly!’) and David Doyle’s Bosley were the only two who weathered all 110 episodes. In 2000, Sony decided it was time for a modern reboot that injected more comedy into the action as the TV series had become quite campy in modern eyes and enlisted Drew Barrymore, Lucy Liu and Cameron Diaz to take on the roles of the new Angels with Bill Murray as Bosley. The three leads returned for a 2003 sequel with Bernie Mac as Bosley, and there was an ill-fated attempt by ABC to reboot the TV series in 2011 with Annie Ilonzeh, Minka Kelly and Rachel Taylor as the Angels with Ramon Rodriguez as Bosley. That lasted all of eight episodes.
But Sony Pictures believes it’s time again to breathe some new life into the property, giving writer/director Elizabeth Banks free reign (on a $48 million budget) to make Charlie’s Angels more about female empowerment than how much they jiggle when they run. The trailer for the new film did not show a lot of promise so I approached the film with the lowest of expectations.
The story expands the world of the Townsend Agency, now a global firm launched under the guidance of the original Bosley (now played by Patrick Stewart badly Photoshopped into images of the original and 2000 edition Angels to make us forget Doyle, Murray and Mac), overseen by a core group of Bosleys (now a code name), to thwart international crimes and recruit new Angels into the group. Our new Angels are Sabina (Kristen Stewart) and Jane (Ella Balinska) with Bosely (Elizabeth Banks) as their contact. A woman who works for an international energy conglomerate, Elena (Naomi Scott), becomes a whistleblower seeking protection from the Townsend Agency when he learns a device she’s created to provide clean energy can be reversed engineered as a weapon. But the higher ups in the company brush off her concerns and insist on moving forward with production. Of course there is someone even higher up who is actually more interested in the device’s potential as a weapon, and the Angels must stop them before many more people die. But with OG Bosley in retirement and their Bosley potentially a double agent, the Angels find themselves working alone while also trying to protect Elena … who doesn’t realize that she’s also being trained to join Charlie’s Angels.
I went into Charlie’s Angels, as I said, with low expectations. Perhaps that was a good thing because I wasn’t completely offended by the time the movie ended. I was actually entertained by the plot with its various plot twists and surprising reveals and deaths. Of the Angels, I enjoyed Balinska’s performance the most. Stewart got on my nerves just a little bit because she reminded me of a slightly less jittery Jesse Eisenberg, but I did appreciate that they allowed her to exhibit interest in other ladies. Scott was also good as she had to be freaked out by everything coming at her while reacting to protect herself and the others. Banks was fine as Bosley, keeping us on our toes as to her loyalties. And Stewart seems to be relishing his role as the OG Bosley.
My questions about the story are mainly centered around the whole concept that the Angels are now a global organization with women working in all parts of the world. Why, then, did they have to fly Sabina and Jane to Germany to meet with Bosley (Djimon Hounsou) instead of putting the German Angels on the case? And then jet them all around the world to follow the leads. Isn’t the point of an international organization to utilize the employees in those local agencies? For all the talk, it really seemed like there were only two Angels doing all the heavy lifting (more are revealed later but only as back-up).
The film is billed as an action-adventure comedy, and neither the action nor comedy really stick the landing. There are some okay action scenes, but a lot of the hand-to-hand combat moments are overly choreographed. At one point Jane is fighting an assassin, Hodak (Jonathan Tucker), and she tells him he has seven moves. We know that because we can count along as he goes through each of them in the same way he appears to be counting like it’s dance steps. Credit to Banks though for not shooting these scenes in extreme close-up that would have rendered them difficult to discern what was happening … but would also cover some of the clumsiness of the choreography (but hey, Sony only have her $45 million and that was probably spent on locations). More egregious are the jokes, not a single one that garnered more than a couple of chuckles from a handful of people in the audience.
So is Charlie’s Angels a complete and total disaster and waste of time? No. It’s mildly entertaining, it has some good performances and a fun, twisty plot. Action and comedy are lacking a bit, but it’s an okay diversion for a couple of hours, and hopefully the cameo-filled end credits will include some of those famous faces in a sequel.
Charlie’s Angels has a run time of 1 hour 58 minutes and is rated PG-13 for action/violence, language and some suggestive material.
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