Mark Reviews Movies: BLACK WIDOW (2021)

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Review by Mark Dujsik | July 8, 2021

There's a certain freedom to the story of Black Widow that hasn't been possible in the so-called Marvel Cinematic Universe for some time. This installment, in a few ways, doesn't matter within the grand scheme of interconnected superheroes or an ultimate villain's universe-halving plot. All of that hasn't been settled at this point within this particular movie's timeline, but we know how all of it—including the final fate of the eponymous hero—will be settled. The filmmakers proceed keeping that latter fact in mind.

In other words, this movie can do things that a good number of its predecessors weren't able to do, because it's not beholden to continuing and/or expanding some larger tale. We know a battle will be fought and inevitably won against a villainous, genocidal titan. We know Natasha Romanov (Scarlett Johansson), aka Black Widow, will become one of the casualties of that fight. We know, in theory (since death isn't necessarily a permanent status in comic books), that this installment is a send-off of sorts for this character, who has been overlooked and underutilized as the cast and world of this series have grown exponentially larger.

What's important, though, is that screenwriter Eric Pearson forgets all of that for this tale. The only things that matter here are—for some, finally—giving Natasha a bit more history and providing her with a standalone adventure, putting her on the same level as some of her noteworthy allies.

There's some freedom here, then, but there's also a bit of nostalgia for the way the superhero movies in this franchise used to be—if one can become nostalgic about movies that are just on either side of being a decade old. The stakes here are personal, not global (at least until the climax) or cosmic. The character and her actions are relatively grounded—with "relatively" being the operative word, in a world where even a former Russian assassin like Natasha can effortlessly pull off seemingly impossible stunts.

The cast is limited only to characters who are essential for this particular story, and we actually get a sense of those characters beyond the necessities of the plot. The plot here, which eventually does overtake every other concern with a lot of over-the-top but decidedly generic action setpieces, is another matter, but even then, there's a feeling of the old days of these movies returning. All of this may be predictable formula, but at least it's focused while being predictable and formulaic.

For those who care, the bulk of the story in this installment is set between the civil war that divided the Avengers, as well as other superheroes, and the battle over those powerful gems. Natasha is on the run from the United States government. She receives a mysterious package and travels to Budapest, a place she knows from a past mission that solidified her defection from Russia and made her an Avenger, to find the sender.

From the opening prologue, which shows a young Natasha as part of a Russian sleeper cell in the Midwest, Pearson and director Cate Shortland establish the movie's primary goals: to play within the realm of spy tales and to play with the dynamics of Natasha's earliest "family." The former, of course, means that Natasha travels to various locations around the globe (and, for the climax, up in the sky), encountering challenges and participating in fights and executing various, sneaky plans.

That's the usual stuff, although it's punctuated by quite a bit of outlandish spectacle. This movie is, after all, still part of a franchise revolving around superheroes and their superhuman antics, so it's not as if the filmmakers are just going to downplay the spectacle on account of the hero's very human nature.

Natasha doesn't just find herself in a car chase. She's in one that results in a ridiculous level of destruction. A prison break here involves a helicopter, a mounted machine gun, plenty of punishing punches and kicks, and an incoming avalanche from a nearby mountain. Natasha's main foes, the villainous Dreykov (Ray Winstone) and the mysterious Taskmaster, are bland in that extravagant way of superhero lore. The former wants to control world affairs with his team of mind-controlled women assassins. The latter is a perfect mimic, who can adopt the fighting techniques of all of Natasha's superhero friends, and when the two have their final duel, it's in the process of freefalling tens of thousands of feet above ground through plummeting debris.

The movie's second goal—the stuff involving the "family"—is far more satisfying. Natasha's "sister" Yelena (Florence Pugh), who has enlisted Natasha to stop Deykov's plan with an antidote to his brainwashing, is resentful and, perhaps, a bit jealous of her Avenger "sibling," hiding the pain of feeling abandoned by mocking Natasha's penchant for posing. Their "father" Alexei (David Harbour) was once the Red Guardian, a superhero relic of the Soviet era, now washed up and searching for validation that's never coming, and the loyalty of their "mother" Melina (Rachel Weisz) is an open question.

When it's exploring and playing with these dynamics, the material is at its freest and, hence, its most entertaining. This element of the movie feels so different from the bulk of the franchise that it's ultimately disappointing how much of Black Widow is, in its comparatively limited way, just more of the same.

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