Movie Title: Colombiana
Genre: Action, Drama, Thriller
Director: Olivier Megaton
Writer: Luc Besson and Robert Mark Kamen
Starring: Zoe Saldana, Jordi Mollà, Lennie James, Amandla Stenberg, Michael Vartan, Cliff Curtis, Beto Benites, Graham McTavish
Review: After witnessing the murder of her parents as a child, the now adult Cataleya (Zoe Saldana) has trained to become a deadly assassin. Now she's ready to hunt down and get revenge on those responsible for her parents' deaths.
Colombiana is yet another revenge action movie from the Taken and Transporter series creators Luc Besson and Robert Mark Kamen. Unfortunately Colombiana, much like the sequels to the aforementioned film franchises, is very "been there, done that". The saving grace here is post-Star Trek, pre-Guardians of the Galaxy star Zoe Saldana. Saladana is tough, smart, sexy, and very deadly as our revenge-seeking lead. She carries the movie effortlessly and really gives it her all. I also enjoyed Lennie James as the frustrated agent trying to find and stop Saldana's Cataleya before she starts an all-out war with some very, very...very bad dudes.
The action and some of the set pieces are impressive, but the romance between Zoe Saldana and Michael Vartan isn't very compelling, nor are the villains. The villains are just kind of stock bad guys that we've seen in tons of action pictures like these. They don't really seem like much of a threat, but we enjoy watching Saldana taking them out one by one.
Colombiana is entertaining, but most of the time you think that you've seen it before and much better in most cases. Come for the action and stay for the Saladana. This movie does show audiences why she's one of the Guardians of the Galaxy and the lead in James Cameron's Avatar franchise - coming soon in 2021.
Fun Fact: The film was based on a script that was set to be a sequel for Léon: The Professional (1994). The story was set to follow Natalie Portman's character Mathilda as she tracked down and killed characters that had wronged her and Leon. Due to rights issues with the studio behind the first film it was cancelled and the script was turned into Colombiana.