HAYWIRE - **1/2

Directed bySteven Soderbergh. Starring Gina Carano, Michael Douglas, Michael Fassbender, Antonio Banderas. USA. 2012. Certificate: 15.

Release Date: 21st May 2012.

HAYWIRE just doesn’t seem possible, how can such an all star cast and well respected director whose past work has included the OCEANS series of films go so wrong, something about HAYWIRE didn’t quite work for me. On paper it looks great and with a solid enough story but it just doesn’t quite work out that way. It feels as though this movie is a demonstration of Gina Caranos abilities in fighting but her acting really lets her down, when you have seen one fight scene you have seen them all. This is where the let down factor of HAYWIRE starts, pretty looking lead, great fighting ability but about as wooden as Sherwood Forest unfortunately. I much preferred last years HANNA in comparison to this as at least you feel something and care about the strong female lead, here you just sit and watch one fight scene after another interspersed with uninspired dialogue.

HAYWIRE follows Caranos character Mallory Kane, a strictly off the radar special agent for the CIA and we follow here to glamorous locations around the world such as Barcelona and then onto Dublin before she realises that her paymasters are ultimately betraying her. Cutting you a (thankfully not too) long story short, she realises what is going on and yet more fight scenes and drivel dialogue follow.

That is the basic premise of HAYWIRE, like a month in the life of Mallory Kane. That in itself is all well and fine if you actually had an interest in her but she lost my interest through her inability to act. That isn’t a personal criticism but it feels like a poor casting choice where looks and ability to fight took precedence over any sort of acting talent.

As for everyone else, well no one does anything wrong, they just do what they can with the script they have been given. Michael Fassbender rolls up as an Irish assassin and guess what, yes you guessed it; gets brutally beaten and killed by Kane after she discovers he has been double crossing her. It all feels so repetitive that by the end of this movie you just feel like it’s some sort of cinematic groundhog day.

The worst part in all of this is that it isn’t a bad movie, not by a long shot but it is seriously flawed. The lead role was badly chosen, I’m not sure who my suggestion who be for the lead cast but the choice of Carano wasn’t a good one. The plot itself is all well and fine but it just doesn’t keep me interested enough to care what actually happens and for an action film it is quite dialogue heavy. Then finally when exciting things do happen it feels like a vehicle to display the MMA talents of its leading character rather than any sort of on screen fighting.

To summarize HAYWIRE could and should have been a decent film but it falls way short of its potential. When you look at say the character of Salander in THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO by comparison, Mallory Kane is a poor imitator. This movie may capture the interests of a few and maybe those who appreciate the sport of MMA might find something here but to an average viewer such as myself it was a mediocre experience.

Disc Extras: Interestingly, in the bonus features it is explained that after seeing Carano fight on TV they wanted to construct a movie around her hence how HAYWIRE was born. Also on the extras are two additional features on the characters of the movie and another entitled The Men Of Haywire which does exactly what it says in its title. Finally there is the obligatory trailer. Again they don’t add anything to the overall package but for those MMA fans who watch this movie, they will find the segment “Gina Carano In Training” very interesting.

Kris Keogh

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