The Movie Doctor: Movie Review: "Hanna"

Movie Review: “Hanna”

Joe Wright is an amazing director. Atonement and The Soloist are two great movies that I have had the pleasure to see. So, when I heard his next film was going to be an action movie about an young assassin girl I became extremely excited. That excitement peaked yesterday when I watched that film in the theaters. The movie was Hanna. Hanna is one of the greatest action movies ever made. Joe Wright really outdoes himself telling the compelling story of Hanna, a young teenage assassin who is trained by her father to kill Marissa Wiegler the woman who killed her mother.

Wright is someone who is a master of what I like to call “one-shot wonders.” In all his films he has these amazingly complex long shots that are visually stunning and although other great filmmakers ,Paul Thomas Anderson and Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu, are able to accomplish this Joe Wright’s ones are just… perfect. My favorite shot in the film is a fight scene with Erik Heller (Hanna’s father). The shot starts off him walking in a train station. He walks through the train station, down the escalator to the subway, and then proceeds a long and intense fight scene with four special agents. When the sequence was finished I was in awe.

It is shots like these that are really astounding in the film. David Farr and Seth Lochead’s script is great and is made even better with all the performances given in the movie. Hanna is played by Saoirse Ronan who has already proven her amazing talent in Atonement and The Lovely Bones. Eric Bana does a great job as Erik really portraying the feelings of a worried father. Cate Blanchett does an incredible job as Marrissa Wiegler who plays the villain of the movie. Everything about her character is frightening already ,but when Blanchett performs you can feel the hatred and sorrow as it exudes through the screen. There is an great scene where she assassinates someone who is related to Erik. Certain dialogue is said and as she pulls out the gun to kill her victim her hands are shaking and she can not even get the silencer put it on the weapon right. It really is incredible to watch.

Now I love eccentric characters, especially when written and performed correctly. I think on the screen it can be so compelling to watch and a direct example of what I am talking about is the character of Isaacs in this film. Tom Hollander plays a very peculiar killer who is hired by Marrisa to kill Hanna. He always wears very bright clothing, whistles a very peculiar tune, and talks in a very creepy way. He is amazing to watch there is one scene in particular where in search of Hanna he stumbles upon and opens up a tent to only find a little boy sleeping there. The little boy asks him who he was and Isaacs proclaims, “I’m the Sandman.” It might not sound like much when reading it, but the way Tom says the line is just creepy.

Then to top off this already incredible journey the score by The Chemical Brothers is just brilliant. There are really no words to describe how amazing it is other than it might be my favorite score of all time.

Hanna is a must-see in theaters. It has incredible action sequences, amazing acting, a fantastic script, and a mind blowing score. In all, I not only think that it’s Joe Wright’s best film but will definetly remain as one of the best movies of 2011.