Gunpowder Milkshake (2021)

Directed by Navot Papushado. Starring Karen Gillan, Lena Headey, Carla Gugino, Angela Bassett, Michelle Yeoh, Chloe Coleman, Paul Giamatti, Ralph Ineson, Michael Smiley, Ivan Kaye, David Burnell IV, Jack Bandeira, Adam Nagaitis. [R]

Arch, highly artificial action picture brings some grrrl power to its bare-bones plotting, but superficiality renders it all as a meaningless exercise. With more posturing than emotion, a group of female assassins (including Gillan and long-absent mama Headey) choose to fight back against their male-dominated “firm” of controllers while protecting a kidnapped little girl (Coleman). Hyper-stylized and kitschy to a fault—some segments blur the line between cutesy and smug—and so indebted to the John Wick movies that it’s practically an alternate universe spinoff (or parody). The actors do what they can with vacantly underwritten roles (e.g., Coleman gets to be wide-eyed and declare herself to be 8¾ years old, and that’s about it), the fetishistic gunplay provides a temporary sugar rush, and the neon-colored production design is enjoyable for a while before overkill inevitably kicks in, but nothing about this fantasy world lingers in the way that the best of its shoot-‘em-up forebears did. Also, whether shown in real-time speed or slo-mo, the group-fight action choreography is clumsily staged/executed, and in a disposable movie like this, that really matters.

47/100