Hollywood replaced tough action guys with feminist trash...

I like Noomi Rapace. I'm usually willing to watch anything she's in... but my gosh are the feminist action films this last decade absolute trash.

The cool thing about 80s bad-action films were that they were guilty pleasures. Tough guys with cool one-liners, repeatable catchphrases, iconic action sequences, and memorable fight scenes.

These days if the film isn't foreign, especially of the South Korean, Russian, or Chinese variety, or if it isn't made by Chad Stahelski, you can basically forget about it being sensibly good (with the exception of Extraction).

The problem with this film is that Noomi's character is supposed to be portrayed as this hardened, cold, get-it-done PMC yet most companies wouldn't hire someone of that small a stature. The average 200lbs man would deck her out cold with a healthy concussion in one hit.

If she were a long-range sniper? Maybe I could buy that. A CQC bodyguard, though? HA!

When was the last time you saw a celebrity or politician surrounded by or accompanied by a just-over- 5-foot 90lbs bodyguard?

Exactly.

Even if you manage to suspend your disbelief that far, you have to deal with action sequences of a groan-worthy nature -- the scene where she has her hands tied behind her back and the guy is struggling to... I don't even know what he was trying to do? He could have just hit her a few times and knocked her out cold yet the fight scene goes on in a very awkward and unconventional manner.

Even if a man had his hands tied behind his back he would have had a tough time fighting off another man of equal size (see the fight scene with the hitman in the film F/X, who had his hands tied up, and despite being more adept in martial arts, still couldn't quite beat the other guy).

It reminded me of being the opposite of the film The Kingdom, where Jennifer Garner's "badass" character gets absolutely manhandled in her one fight sequence, and if memory serves, someone else had to help her, because feminist "girl power" wasn't there to save her.

But all the fight scenes in Close were handled in an awkward, clumsy, and poorly choreographed way. In that eel sequence the guy could have easily choked and drowned her, but we had some James Bond stuff going on to help give her some cover.

And that final sequence in the hall with the mother and daughter? Ugh... talk about groan-inducing.

The one hired thug gets incapacitated by being shot through the butt with his own gun? ROFL... WTF?!

The mother returns to the house without any bodyguards? The one police officer tries to kill the mother/daughter (or was he? That whole thing was a confusing mess) and Noomi uses her wrist to take the bullet yet someone gets the gun from him too? WTF?

This movie's editing, pace, and action were all over the place. It was literally a female version of Chris Hemsworth's Extraction but without the testosterone.

I like Noomi Rapace; I'm usually willing to watch anything she's in. But man all these female-led action films are just tiresome. You just don't have to suspend disbelief, you have to turn your brain off, kill off all forms of common sense, and completely disregard all of the competition out there being pumped out by the Donnie Yens, Scott Adkins, and Keanu Reeves.

A better director, a better scriptwriter, and sadly a more masculine male in the lead could have saved this film.