Ava

Ava
Starring Jessica Chastain, John Malkovich, Colin Farrell, Geena Davis
Directed by Tate Taylor

If you're an A-list female actress in Hollywood, odds are you've starred in at least one spy espionage thriller where you're the main kick-butt-take-names assassin who's (for the most part) targeted for elimination from the company you once worked for.  Angelina Jolie in "Salt."  Charlize Theron in "Atomic Blonde."  Jennifer Lawrence in "Red Sparrow."  Saoirse Ronan in "Hanna."  That random model-wannabe-actress in "Anna."  Now it's Jessica Chastain's turn to take the mantle in "Ava," which is surprisingly more than just the average run-of-the-mill assassin-turned-rogue story, but ultimately nowhere near memorable.

Ava (Jessica Chastain) is a recovering alcoholic and drug user who once had a bright future, but lost it all due to an overbearing, mentally abusive father.  She enlisted in the army, and then took a job as an "executive" (aka assassin) who is trained by Duke (John Malkovich) - a father figure Ava never had - to "close deals" (aka kill a mark).  Ava is great at her job, but there's two problems: she's still a recovering addict and doesn't go by the books, and she tries to get confessions out of the marks before she kills them, which angers other members of the group, especially Duke's first trainee Simon (Colin Farrell).

When an assassination goes bad, Ava is partially blamed and is taken off the grid, and she uses this time to return to her hometown of Boston to make amends with her estranged mother Bobbi (Geena Davis) and sister Judy (Jess Weixler).  As she tries to atone for her past mistakes, Simon makes it his personal vendetta to take Ava out once and for all.

"Ava" makes itself different from other female-assassin films by focusing on the dysfunctional family dynamic that Ava experiences, and surprisingly that's the strongest parts of the film.  Probably because the whole genre has been so stale and typically done since the Jason Bourne era that each fighting sequence is done pretty much the same way with the intense music, shaky cam work, and rushed edits.  It's not the action that's something to write home about here (although some are decent, and one is even humorous in the snarky comments made during it), but it's the deep family issues that drive home the movie and sets it apart.

This is due to Jessica Chastain's compelling, dedicated performance (obviously, since her production company financed the project, and she served as an executive producer).  She plays Ava as someone who's still wrestling with the demons of her past, as well as showing a steely resolve to not allow anyone too close anymore.  She doesn't trust, she doesn't show she cares, and that's what makes her a great assassin - not to mention the years of army and combat training.  When she's home, you see her emotions start to bubble, but never fully come to the surface - showing that she's hardened enough to not show weakness even when surrounded by those who care about her the most.

The additional cast is surprisingly full of A-list actors for a film I literally never heard of until I saw it listed as playing at my local theater.  John Malkovich does superb as Ava's trainer-father figure.  Colin Farrell obviously is in his wheelhouse here.  Yet its Geena Davis who literally comes out of nowhere and delivers the most compelling performance as Ava's mother Bobbi.  For most of the film we see the two go to verbal blows time after time (when Ava fixes Bobbi's television in her hospital room, Bobbi replies with "it must not had been broken"), and we feel a strong disconnect between the two characters - something Ava reveals at a local AA meeting.  Then there's a visit to Bobbi's home where the two women play hearts, and Bobbi pours out her heart to Ava in a stirring, moving moment that you wouldn't expect to find in a film like this.  It was great to see Geena Davis return to the big screen after all this time, and prove that she still has what it takes to deliver a strong performance.

The film moves at a decent pace, and cuts from the family drama to Ava traveling the world to the most beautiful hotels in the most luxurious dresses to perform her job, which themselves are decently shot and edited, if not typical for this type of genre.  There's some side stories involving Ava's sister's fiance who was once with Ava but got with her sister after she left, and now has a struggling gambling problem, and Ava deals with that issue as only she knows how, providing another great action sequence of two to stir up the possible monotony.  Yet through it all, I continually felt that this film was just alright - nothing extraordinary, nothing bad, just something decent for one viewing.

With "Ava," Jessica Chastain manages to balance hardened assassin with struggling alcoholic dealing with family drama perfectly, but combining the two themes doesn't really make either one stand out in any strong way.

The Score: B