Director Report Card: Cate Shortland (2021)

5. Black Widow

The question of why it took so long for Marvel to give Black Widow her own movie has a number of answers. As a character, Black Widow doesn't have the legacy of stories the way many of her fellow Avengers do. She doesn't have her own “Demon in a Bottle,” her own “Winter Solider,” her own “Infinity Gauntlet Saga.” The other reason is a lot more obvious: Hollywood has a problem with women-led superheroes movies. Former Marvel CEO Ike Perlmutter specifically seemed to have a problem with women-led superhero movies. This is presumably why it took until 2018 for a project starring huge star Scarlett Johansson, reprising a role she played in some of the biggest blockbusters in cinema history, to begin production. ScarJo herself would have a producer credit on the movie and picked Cate Shortland to direct from a long list of candidates, based on the strength of “Lore.”

Of course, this was before COVID put the world – and the entertainment world most of all – on pause for an entire year. In that time, “Black Widow” went from being just another cog in Marvel's endless machine of box office dominance to the first massive superhero movie to open since the pandemic began. After multiple release date shifts, the movie has finally come out in the middle of summer. While it's not the first giant, effects-driven action movie I've seen since I got my vaccine, there is admittedly something comforting about seeing that Marvel logo up on the screen again after a long absence. Love 'em or hate 'em, superhero movies were yet another part of our normal lives that were disrupted by the pandemic. Having that back feels like another step towards normalcy being restored.

Set directly after “Civil War,” “Black Widow” sees Natasha Romanoff on the run from S.H.E.I.L.D. While hiding out in Norway, she receives a package containing mysterious red viles. After surviving an attack by a masked assassin who can mirror her every move, Natasha seeks out the person who sent her the package: Yelena Belova, a fellow assassin that Natasha grew up with as her "sister." Yelena informs her that the Red Room – the Soviet program to turn girls into brainwashed killers – still exists. Teaming up with Melina and Alexei, the other members of their makeshift family of Russian assets, Natasha seeks to take down the Red Room forever and free all the other Black Widows.

It's been noted before that the Marvel Cinematic Universe has a lingering obsession with father figures. This might just be because Daddy issues are relatable but it's made family a reoccurring theme in these movies. "Black Widow" foregrounds the Marvel fixation on family in several different ways. Mostly, it allows for a lot of smaller, funny moments. The highlight of the movie is when Natasha and Yelena are sitting around a dinner table with their parental figures. Alexei may be the Soviet equivalent to Captain America and Melina is a brilliant scientist but they are also amusingly warm towards their pseudo-daughters. Melina tells Natasha not to slouch and Alexei regales his daughters with rambling anecdotes from his years of adventuring. The image of a team of superheroes sitting around a table, eating potato salad and squabbling like family, is definitely worth a laugh or two.

Focusing the movie on this off-beat family unit gives "Black Widow" a feel distinct from most Marvel flicks. A long stretch of the film is set on Melina's farm, focusing on the characters talking out their various feelings towards one another. This is sandwiched between two huge, extended action sequences, which feel a lot less distinct. One gets the impression that Cate Shortland was a lot more interested in the familial squabbling than the special effects-packed fight scenes. This push-and-pull between the director's indie movie sensibilities and the obligations of a superhero blockbuster sometimes gives "Black Widow" an unsteady feeling. 

Making Natasha the star of her own movie also allows us more of a peek into the character's psyche than we've ever gotten before. Throughout her previous seven cinematic appearances, Natasha has made references to the red in her ledger. We finally find out what that's all about: Black Widow had to kill a kid once and it fucked her up. Which is understandable but it seems overly simplistic that one incident is the root of her guilt. Throughout the movie, it's asked how Natasha "kept her heart" after being a professional killer for so many years. "Black Widow" never quite answers the question of how Romanoff balanced her empathetic qualities with her time spent murdering people for the Russian government, despite Scarlett Johansson's attempts to add some gasping, teary-eyed emotion to this role she's played so often.

Anytime a smaller director is scooped up by the massive Hollywood blockbuster machine, I always try to see if any of their trademarks or pet themes survive the transition. While I was really hoping "Black Widow" would be another Cate Shortland movie about a damaged outsider seeking self-forgiveness – and, as I said, it kind of is – you can most tell who the director is due to the film's feminist ideas. We quickly learn that the Red Room is controlled by one person: Dr. Dreykov. One man de-personalizing countless girls, to turn them into tools for his own wicked plan, is an obvious criticism of the dehumanizing way women are treated in our patriarchal society. When Natasha comes face-to-face with Dreykov, he's touchy and sleazy. (An angle Ray Winstone's somewhat over-the-top performance definitely leans into.) Ultimately, Natasha most wounds this villain, this author of all her pain, with her words. Even though Dreykov certainly knows this woman is a master manipulator, he still allows her to rile him up by insulting his fragile, masculine ego. 

It's certainly a point that can never be made too many times: That a lot of men have issues with women having autonomy over their own minds and bodies. Watching Natasha finally take her revenge on Dreykov, and all the dehumanizing forces he represents, should be satisfying. But, like most Marvel movies, "Black Widow" is politically toothless. Dreykov makes the Widows his literal mind-controlled slaves. The movie's evil scheme is the work of one, somewhat cartoonish guy. The film never broaches the ideas of the sexist forces at work in society in any deeper way. And it certainly doesn't address the lingering effects of the Soviet ideologies in the modern geopolitical landscape, which easily could've intersected with these feminist ideas in a deeper way. It's a toothless critique of a generalized Bad Thing, that doesn't really engage with these concepts. (Honestly, I think "Captain Marvel" handled this stuff better.)

But it's not like we go to Marvel movies to see biting criticism of misogyny. I watch these movies to see beautiful people make quips in-between fights with supervillains. "Black Widow" certainly succeeds in that regard. Its best choice is handing most of those quips to Florence Pugh. Pugh plays Yelena as a smart-mouthed little sister who can easily see through Natasha's pretensions. Her mockery of her sister's tendencies towards superhero landings is the film's best running gag. Pugh has great chemistry with Johansson, showing the mixture of resentment and admiration any younger sibling has for their older sister or brother. And Pugh certainly has no problem being funny and charming while doing green screen-assisted action theatrics. If the hope is for Yelena to take over the franchise, and it obviously is, Marvel did a pretty good job of picking their new star.

As the dysfunctional parents to these bickering sisters, we have David Harbour and Rachel Weisz. Harbour is essentially the movie's comic relief. He plays Alexei as a buffoonish figure, a posturing man-child who can't go more than a few minutes without mentioning his glory days as the Red Guardian. Harbour is good at this kind of broad comedic shenanigans and he also manages to find the occasional nugget of warmth or wisdom under the character's cartoonish exterior. Weisz, meanwhile, is totally overqualified as Melina, a soft-spoken mother figure and brilliant schemer in her own right. Weisz is absolutely qualified to bring a character like this to life, even if she's given few opportunities to really show off her range her.

In the world of previs sci-fi spectacle like this, you never can be certain how much control the director even has over the visual presentation of the movie. However, “Black Widow” sees quite a few of Cate Shortland's trademarks returning... Which isn't always a good thing. The shaky camera work that wasn't too distracting in an indie drama like 'Somersault” or “Lore” proves problematic here, as the first few melee fight scenes are tricky to follow. Which is all the more frustrating since there's some impressive stunt work in there, of flips and bodies slamming into walls and chairs. It gets better as the movie goes on, though some of Shortland's other visual quirks – slow motion and fade-to-white – are also implemented to mixed effect throughout the action scenes.

Which isn't to say “Black Widow” is a bad looking movie. Shortland engineers some eye-catching visuals. A sequence where a group of Widows, in a literal red room, are training and practicing like a choreographed dance trope is pretty cool. So is a moment when a darkened home is suddenly lit up by a bright white-blue spotlight. Yet I continue to believe that the big budget action stuff was what Shortland was the least interested in here. In its last act, “Black Widow” becomes a barrage of CGI destruction. Repeated shots of the actors diving through the sky around falling wreckage features underwhelming green screen effects. Honestly, a movie with this kind of budget and resources that that sat on a shelf for a whole year should look a lot better than that.

That the movie inevitably falls into such underwhelming computer generated chaos is even the more disappointing, considering there's actually some clever writing in the last third. Our ragtag team of heroes put together a scheme to infiltrate the villain's lair and take it down. What makes this interesting is that we are sparingly given the information about this plot. This allows the viewer to be as caught off-guard about some of the twists and turns as the characters are. Some of these are more predictable than others but a few – involving a sci-fi disguise and the blunt way a certain plot device is disposed of – managed to surprise me.

Phase 4 of the Marvel Cinematic Universe does, partially anyway, seem devoted to bringing back some iconic comic villains that the company previously discarded. Perhaps as a way to get more comic accurate incarnations on-screen. Yet the studio is still making the same mistakes of the past. Without getting too spoiler-y, the Taskmaster from the comics, a sarcastic villain-for-hire with a complicated past, doesn't have much in common with the Taskmaster from this movie. Once again, as with the Mandarin and the Skrulls, an iconic comic villain is thrown away in favor of a plot twist. This one is easy to see coming too, once you notice a fairly well-known performer is listed in the opening credits but seemingly doesn't appear in the movie.

If I'm being totally honest, "Black Widow" is not the Black Widow movie I most wanted to see. A direct prequel showing Natasha actually going about her business as a spy and assassin, and what drove her to leave that lifestyle, probably would've been way more interesting to me. Mostly, I guess I just wanted a buddy movie between her and Hawkeye, illustrating the oft-referenced Budapest incident that's been hinting at before. (And is further alluded to here as well.) We certainly see plenty of Black Widow's early days here, thanks to an extended opening that sees Shortland packing in ironic Americana to contrast with this family of fleeing Soviet spies. But I guess I wanted more. 

"Black Widow's" role as merely another component of Marvel/Disney's own plan for global dominance is apparent. Several plot points are left dangling for further adventures and the requisite post-credit scene is an even more blatant set-up for a sequel. Considering Natasha's fate in "Endgame," and the general eagerness the movie shows to get on to the next story, "Black Widow" can't help but feel like a side story to something larger. It's certainly an entertaining movie – and its guaranteed box office victory is another sign that movie theaters are recovering – but the unsatisfactory balance between family issue and typical superhero thrills renders it mid-tier Marvel. A winning cast, lots of funny moments, and the occasional pause for gracefulness certainly go a long way but it can't beat the lingering sense that this is an epilogue, instead of a new beginning. [Grade: B]