Sweet Girl

 Sweet Girl
Starring Jason Momoa, Isabela Merced, Manuel Garcia-Rulfo, Justin Bartha
Directed by Brian Andrew Mendoza

Everyone knows the American medical system is a deeply flawed entity that focuses more on making money than helping people get better - none the more prudent now in this pandemic world where some people still don't trust that Big Pharma has our best interests in mind. Shady backroom deals, corrupt politicians, and greedy pharmaceutical tycoons control pretty much the entire medical supply in America, and will dish it out for a pretty penny. While people believe that healthcare should be an individual's right, it's more than often not treated as a privilege for the highest bidder. "Sweet Girl" could've gone down the "Erin Brockovich" road where a man wronged by Big Pharma gets his revenge against the greedy fat cats, but instead it becomes a lesser-Jason Bourne where said man goes on the hunt for the men he holds responsible for his wife's death, while being hunted down by trained, hired assassins.

Ray Cooper (Jason  Momoa) is a family man, happily living his life with his wife Amanda (Adria Ariona) and daughter Rachel (Milena Rivero). Everything is right with the world, until Amanda comes down with cancer years later. Now with a grown-up Rachel (Isabela Merced), Ray learns that there's a new, effective, inexpensive drug that could save Amanda's life, but it's pulled from the market thanks to BioPrime CEO Simon Keeley (Justin Bartha), and Amanda unfortunately passes away, but not before Ray promises Keeley on national television that he'll kill him if she dies.

Six months later, Ray receives a tip from a journalist that has evidence of a crime committed by BioPrime, but before he can get the information he, the journalist, and Rachel are attacked on the subway by trained hitman Amo Santos (Manuel Garcia-Rulfo). Two years later, Ray has done his own research and prepares himself to get revenge for Amanda's death, as his relationship with Rachel becomes more strained as he is forced to go on the run with her while hired mercenaries and Santos are hot on their trail.

"Sweet Girl" seems to be one of those films that wanted to be something more than what it was. There's glimmers of hope in this overly-padded runtime film where you think that it could go in a decently thoughtful direction, then immediately pull back and resort to tired action tropes and cliches that have littered the action landscape for the past fifty years or so. On one hand it could've been an intense political thriller about bringing Big Pharma down and achieving a big win for the little guy, but then it instead spirals into an almost out-of-control action spectacle filled with people being hurled through glass, makeshift suffocation, and an entirely convoluted twist that renders most of what happened before moot. It almost seemed like the writers wanted to think that they were better than the audience they were writing for, by offering an off-the-wall surprise that was more groan-inducing than gasp-worthy, but it did help answer some of my smaller questions I had during the film.

Jason Momoa is best known for being a lumbering, towering man whose muscles have muscles, so seeing him fighting his way through hired goons and assassins should come as a piece of cake, but almost hilariously he finds himself on his back more often than not, and that might just be due to the fact that all we've seen him in is films where he superhumanly kicks butt without a lock of his flowing Jesus-style hair out of place. While it's laughable, it's also a little refreshing to see such a mountain of a man having problems against average-sized people, allowing the playing field to be widened at least a little bit. Yet he also steps out of his traditional tough-man roles and showcases some real emotions, especially when his wife dies, and seeing him literally break down is really amazing for a man of his caliber. He was almost too good for this forgettable, by-the-books films.

Likewise, Isabela Merced also gives a wholly committed performance as Ray's only daughter Rachel. Isabela is best known for her versatile roles in films like "Transformers: The Last Knight," "Sicario: Day of the Soldado," "Instant Family," and "Dora and the Lost City of Gold," so a film like "Sweet Girl" really is up her alley in terms of action prowess. Yet she, like Momoa, give more than what's required for such a thinly-written script as this.

The film could've been its own entity if they knew what direction they wanted to go in, but instead it flies all over the place as at first it's a searing commentary on the callousness of the American healthcare system, before hit men, assassins, and thugs enter the picture and pretty much just spirals into a generic world of action and violence. The fighting was cool enough, but again nothing that we haven't seen before, and when we get to the third act twist, it is really more insulting than revealing, so much so that they offer a quick rewind to show us how it actually happened - which doesn't make a whole lick of sense. While the action was decent, the story was subpar, and the performers really tried to give it their all to produce something better than the sum of its parts, but ultimately it'll just end up in the long-forgotten memories of action films past, where you'll catch it on some basic cable station years from now and totally forget about it afterward.

While the performers give it their all, "Sweet Girl" is padded down by an overly-long runtime, a cheap twist, and generic action sequences that make it almost impossible to remember even as the credits start rolling, but at least provides a decent escape from reality while watching.

The Score: C-