Proud Mary (2018)

A twenty first century action thriller that borrows liberally from movies of previous decades (including the 1970s - a bit), PROUD MARY comes to UK DVD courtesy of Sony.

Mary (Taraji P Henson) is a hit woman working for an organised crime syndicate in Boston. When her latest hit leaves a young boy without a father, she finds herself keeping an eye on the lad and, when he collapses in an alley after being badly beaten, she takes him in. Little does Mary realise that this is only the beginning of how her world is about to radically change. 

The problem with PROUD MARY is that it isn't terrible, but it isn't terribly good, either. Everything about it feels slightly off. The opening music and title sequence suggests we're in for an updated Pam Grier - Jack Hill exploitation picture but sadly no-one involved with this is able to give the movie quite the sass and self-confidence it needs to pull that off. Editing varies between lacklustre (the opening post-credit sequence suffers because of this) and then sudden rapid fire in some dialogue scenes, where it quickly becomes wearing. 

Prominently billed cast members Neal McDonough and Xander Berkeley are hardly in it, and poor old Danny Glover looks as if he's having quite a painful time in any scene where he's not sitting down. 

Better direction would have been an immense help, as PROUD MARY never seems to settle and decide what it wants to be. A big part of the problem is that for much of the running time star Taraji P Henson plays the lead role less as a ruthless and hardened assassin and more like a tired, hungover office employee who has been landed with looking after her younger sister's little boy for the weekend. In fact the movie might actually have worked better if that had actually been the plot. As it is we are left wondering how someone like this has managed to be quite so successful in her chosen profession when even a small child can get into her massive gun cupboard.

The movie also echoes Luc Besson's LEON with an intriguing gender switch, but there's far too much talk and too little in the way of action. Things do get eventually going with a final guns 'n' cars sequence that's quite fun but by then it really is a case of a bit too little a lot too late.

Sony's DVD release comes with three behind the scenes featurettes. 'Mary's World' has interviews with cast and crew, 'The Beginning of the End' details the shooting of the climactic action sequence, and 'If Looks Could Kill' is all about the design of Mary's 'look'.

PROUD MARY is out on UK DVD from 

Sony from 30th July 2018