Ava is a highly trained deadly assassin who now works for a black ops organisation travelling the world specialising in very high profile hits. When her latest job goes very wrong she must fight for her own life as everyone she once trusted turns against her.
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Ava truly had the potential to be a very good action film with a strong female leading character however it fails very short of that was a rather boring storyline that doesn't have the engagement factor to keep you wanting more. Which is a little bit of a shame considering it only has a running time of 96 minutes, it actually feels more like a two hour slog.
Ava had a lot of issues and had previously struggled with drugs and alcohol. This turned her mother against her when she was blackmailed by her own father. She discovered he was having an affair and threatened to tell he mother if he did not himself. Instead of coming clean he lies and says Ava had stole money from them. This then led to her abandoning her family until her father died. The relationship with her mother and sister was therefore very difficult and strained.
Given the relationship with her father being destroyed quite early on given the circumstances, her boss Duke becomes like a father figure as well as a mentor. This actually created a rather interesting character as he was someone who believed in her but also stood up for her as well. During the assassinations on the targets she was known for getting too close and questioning them. This was something we witnessed in the first scene and it was probably one of the best moments. Asking Peter why someone had paid to have him killed. It was tense but then everything after that moment was a little bit dull.
I thought when Simon turned up along with Michael that it might have made things a little bit more interesting but by that point I wasn't really too bothered. I guess we could have found out more about her relationship with Michael and how she so easily just left him?
The thing is Jessica Chastain was good enough in the leading role but true let down by the lack of depth within the storyline as her character was interesting but we just didn't get enough of it. John Malkovich offered good support as always. Geena Davis was good casting as Chastain's mother as well, certainly believable enough for me. Colin Farrell was wasted in his role, which left me very disappointed in that sense.
We have had an influx of female led action films so I guess they cannot all be good and enjoyable. We will get the odd ones like Ava where it just doesn't fully work out very well. Quite a difficult genre to hit all of the marks for, but I guess it was a decent try? That is trying to end this review on a nice note as I do feel a little bit harsh. The film just lacked something to keep it fully engaging.