REVIEW OF ATOMIC BLONDE STARRING CHARLIZE THERON

Year Released: July of 2017 AtomicScore: **

It seems rather uptight, and now very dated, even cliché, to use the term Gratuitous Violence. There are two kinds, though: When Violence is exaggerated for effect, or, as in the case of ATOMIC BLONDE, masking the fact that no real story's behind it... 

There are good things about this BLONDE. Great, actually, as in... looking. With Charlize Theron at the helm that's no surprise. The lesbian scenes are sexy and very welcome, and the music, like anything post-Tarantino, works to move the action forward in a pop culture blitz. Taking place at the tail-end of the late-1980's Cold War, hours before the Berlin Wall came down, Germany is full of neon combined with grainy Noir lighting within pulsating nightclubs and sun-exposed boulevards... 

Xena & Gabrielle

Tasty old school tracks ranging from "99 Luftballoons" to "I Ran (So Far Away)" provide the time-period beat and are used in a creative fashion audibly: one second blaring as loud as the soundtrack to envelope the scene's power, and the next more realistically playing straight from a doomed "ghetto blaster." Meanwhile, the frantic karate-kicking fights are non-stop in a JOHN WICK fashion... 

The problem is, there's just no reason for any of it: one scene merely follows the next. Theron's Lorraine Broughton is being politely interrogated, edited as a form of narration from beginning to end, and while there are some sticky situations to get out of, the lack of purpose and intrigue makes for very little suspense  And sarcastic co-star James McAvoy has initial potential but then comes to absolutely nothing — just like everyone and everything else.