Birds of Prey (2020)

Directed by Cathy Yan

Starring: Margot Robbie, Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Jurnee Smollett-Bell, Rosie Perez, Ella Jay Basco & Ewan McGregor

It is no surprise that many people consider 2016’s Suicide Squad to be a low-point in the mass superhero trend of the 2010’s. Almost completely worthless thanks to post-production, the film was saved by one character alone. Now four years later, Harley Quinn returns to the big screen in a movie that will be forgotten in two months.

Margot Robbie can do anything she wants in Hollywood right now. That power led to a Birds of Prey adaptation in which none of the Birds characters matter and instead take a back seat to Harley Quinn. In the film, Quinn has finally ended it with Jared Leto’s Joker, who thankfully is nowhere to be seen, and now must learn to take care of herself without his protection. Things go awry for Harley when a young street criminal (Ella Jay Brasco) swallows a diamond sought after by infamous mafia leader Black Mask (Ewan McGregor) and now she must protect the both of them. Oh yeah and the rest of the Birds of Prey team help too I guess.

Harley Quinn is one of many great supporting Batman villains and when I say supporting, I absolutely mean supporting. Despite Robbie’s clear dedication to this character, Quinn is just far too irritating to work as a story focus. She’s crazy, abrasive and prone to violence without thinking and that’s about it. There is nothing else much to the character and it clearly shows because even though it’s only her second live-screen appearance, I’m very much sick of Harley. The script leaves everyone else playing to second fiddle and sees fan favourites such as Huntress (Mary Elizabeth Winstead­) and Black Canary (Jurnee Smollett-Bell) turned into generic support characters who could easily be cut with another rewrite. DC finally brings Black Mask to the screen as well but of course Ewan McGregor is given nothing to do. His character is just over-the-top mob boss who is portrayed so comically that he barely expresses any fear or intimidation.

While Cathy Yan tries to distinguish the film from other DC titles, there is nothing really interesting about her direction overall. The bright vibrant art direction of the film works for its main character and is a large step above the disgusting puke green cinematography of Suicide Squad. The film also boasts a noticeable improvement in action sequences while still sadly retaining the DC slow-motion effect which tends to suck the energy out of the choreography. The soundtrack is, for the most part, awful and continues Suicide Squad’s love of shitty trailer pop songs shoved in awkwardly to make the audience happy.

The film’s worst mistake is to not tell a linear story and instead opt to have Harley narrate majority of scenes. This technique treats the audience like they are dumb and explicitly states every character’s motivations and feelings. This in turn ruins the Birds of Prey; especially Huntress who has her entire story fed through a few flashbacks. The nonlinear plot becomes confusing with several whole sequences not making sense until Harley explains them later on.

Birds of Prey really tries to set itself apart by being weird and edgy but sadly yet again is a forgettable vehicle for DC. Margot Robbie gives her all as Harley Quinn but that can’t save a bland plot, poor characterisation, terrible soundtrack and overall mediocre direction. If DC really wants a winner with this character than they need to try a lot harder. Thank god James Gunn is directing The Suicide Squad.

4/10