Review #238: 'Hanna' (2011)

11 year-old Hanna (Saoirse Ronan) lives in the wilderness with her father Erik (Eric Bana). He teaches her to hunt, fight, and basically fend for herself. As Hanna grows restless in isolation, she puts in motion a plan that the two have seemingly been planning for years. She pushes a button, alerting CIA agent Marissa (Cate Blanchett) to their whereabouts. While Erik leaves, Hanna waits and is captured. After being questioned, Hanna kills who she believes to be Marissa and escapes her prison. She finds herself in Saudi Arabia where she befriends a hippy-ish English family, where is pursued by Marissa and her hired goons.

If the story of a young, jail-bait assassin kicking the arse of anyone in her path sounds familiar, it would be easy to make comparisons to Chloe Moretz's Hit-Girl in Kick-Ass (2010). But this is a very different animal. Where Kick-Ass was cartoonish and over-the-top in its (very enjoyable) gory action scenes, Hanna takes more of a dramatic route, combined with characteristics of a modern-day fairytale. This approach works both for and against the film, as although its approach is individual and quite refreshing, it is also confused and often slapdash in its execution.

I'll start with the good, which there is plenty of. The cast is splendid - Bana and Blanchett are long established solid actors with an impressive backlog of films so they do what is expected of them. Blanchett hams it up with a ridiculous Southern American accent, and she manages to out-sexy her performance in the recent Indiana Jones And The Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (2008). Ronan, who so impressed in director Joe Wright's excellent Atonement (2007), strides confidently through another great performance, mixing steely coldness with a wide-eyed innocence as she struggles with this brave new world full of televisions, lights and kettles. And Tom Hollander, a seemingly strange choice for a heavy, is amazingly horrific as a crowbar-wielding, transsexual strip-club owner with a liking for terrible tracksuits.

While I was expecting an all-out action film before pressing play, I was pleased with the way the film told Hanna's story. Instead of filling it with action scenes, it takes it's time to show Hanna's discovery of the world, and sweet friendship with Sophie (Jessica Barden). When she joins Sophie's parents Rachel (Olivia Williams) and Sebastian (Jason Flemyng), she discovers boys, dancing, and what she has longed for the most - music. Her father regularly read from an encyclopaedia so she can learn the things of the world, but music cannot be truly described in words, and this is one of the main reasons she initially chooses to leave her sheltered life.

Joe Wright, traditionally more at home with period pieces such as Atonement and Pride & Prejudice (2005), struggles with the action scenes. While they are accompanied by a thumping score by The Chemical Brothers, he never really finds a certain style. Sometimes it is fast hand-to-hand to combat filmed on shaky-cam like the Bourne (2002-2007) films; sometimes the camera will be swirling all over the place; one time it is filmed in ultra slo-mo like an operatic tragedy. Wright even attempts something similar to his one-shot Dunkirk scene in Atonement, tracking Bana from a train station into the underground where he disposes of a gang of agents. While it may sound good to differ the style, it does unsteady the tone of the film, especially when played against the quieter, more tender moments.

Hanna is certainly interesting and I would certainly recommend it to anyone looking for something a bit different from the usual action film, but ultimately it becomes nothing more than an appealing oddity. Ronan is certainly an actress to watch, and Joe Wright will have done no damage to his growing reputation here, and will undoubtedly go from strength to strength.


Directed by: Joe Wright
Starring: Saoirse Ronan, Eric Bana, Cate Blanchett, Tom Hollander, Jessica Barden, Olivia Williams, Jason Flemyng
Country: USA/UK/Germany

Rating: ***

Tom Gillespie