Red Sparrow

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Movie
German title Red Sparrow
Original title Red Sparrow
Country of production United States
original language English
Publishing year 2018
length 141 minutes
Age rating FSK 16
Rod
Director Francis Lawrence
script Justin Haythe
production Peter Chernin ,
Steven Zaillian ,
Jenno Topping ,
David Ready
music James Newton Howard
camera Jo Willems
cut Alan Edward Bell
occupation

Red Sparrow ( English Red Sparrow ) is an American thriller by Francis Lawrence with Jennifer Lawrence in the lead role. The film is based on the novel Operation Red Sparrow , which was published in English in 2013 and in German in 2015 , for which the author Jason Matthews received the Edgar Award for the best first novel by a US in 2014 from the National Office of Mystery Writers of America , New York American author and which is the first part of a 2013-2018 trilogy of spy novels published.

action

The Russian prima ballerina Dominika Egorova cannot continue her job after an injury. Her employer then stops paying her mother's vital medical treatment. From her uncle Ivan Egorov, the deputy director of the Russian foreign intelligence service SWR , Dominika not only learns that her accident was deliberately caused by a competing prima ballerina and her lover and was not a coincidence, but also receives the offer to seduce Dimitri Ustinov - a Russian oligarch to get information. In return, the government will ensure her mother's medical care. Dominika seduces Ustinov in a hotel and makes sure that Ustinov sends his bodyguards out of the room to be alone with her. When Ustinov rapes her, he is killed by Matorin, a killer from the SpetsNaz unit commissioned by Ivan . Dominika learns that her actual mission was to separate Ustinov from his bodyguards and thus enable his murder. Ivan gives Dominika a choice: Either she can be trained as an agent by the SWR or she is killed as a witness to the attack. Dominika is part of the so-called Sparrow program, a group of young agents who are trained to seduce and manipulate their target persons. The training pushes them to their physical and psychological limits; however, it does not stop and makes it through the program.

Her first assignment as Sparrow is to monitor CIA agent Nathaniel (Nate) Nash. He met a Russian mole some time ago in Gorky Park and is one of the few CIA agents who know his exact identity. Since Nate can no longer return to Russia and the mole only maintains contact with him, the CIA sends Nate to Budapest in the hope that he will make contact with the mole again there. Dominika's mission is to win Nate's trust in order to reveal the identity of the mole.

Once in Budapest, Dominika has to share the apartment with Marta - another Sparrow. Their job is to thread a deal with an American chief of staff by the name of Boucher, which will sell US secret documents to the SWR for $ 250,000. Meanwhile, Dominika gets in touch with Nate. In order to gain his trust, she allows him to find out her true identity. Dominika offers Nate and the CIA to work as a double agent. In order to convince the Americans, she takes Marta's preparatory work with Boucher for herself. When Marta, who learned about Ustinov's murder from Dominika, wants to use this knowledge for her own purposes, she is tortured and murdered by Matorin. This also serves as a warning to Dominika if she reveals state secrets again.

A meeting with Boucher takes place in a hotel in London . Since Dominika now also works for the CIA, she exchanges the floppy disks received from Boucher so that the real information remains in the Americans' possession. Boucher then takes the money and leaves the hotel. Chased by CIA agents, Boucher runs in front of a truck, which catches them and kills them. The Russians, who got wind of Dominika's double game through a local contact, then order her back to Moscow . There she is first interrogated and then tortured because she is blamed for Boucher's death. Dominika is able to persuade her uncle to give her one last chance, as the identity of the mole is still not clear.

Back in Budapest, she contacts Nate again and announces that she intends to defeat . In exchange for state secrets, she would like to have $ 250,000 transferred to a bank account she opened in Vienna . Nate agrees and the two spend the night together. When Dominika wakes up, she finds Nate tied up by Matorin, who is torturing him to get the name of the mole. Dominika initially pretends to be on Matorin's side, but with Nate's help, kills him at the last second. Both are injured in battle. In the hospital, the mole finally contacts her. It is General Vladimir Korchnoi, who is dissatisfied with the development of the political system in recent years and also blames him for the death of his wife. Since Korchnoi suspects that he will soon be exposed, he offers Dominika to be extradited in order to rehabilitate her.

Thereupon Dominika lets the Hungarian authorities take her captive and arranges an exchange: her back to the Russians and the mole to the Americans. Nate is supposed to accompany them and confirm the identity of the mole. When the identity is revealed, however, it is not Korchnoi that is shown, but Dominika's uncle Ivan. Flashbacks show the full extent of Dominika's plan of revenge: the bank account in Vienna is in Ivan's name, the 250,000 dollars transferred to it are to be interpreted as a defector, a glass with Nate's fingerprints can be found in Ivan's office and Boucher's disks are based on it The encryption reveals that they are forgeries, which were not described in the US Embassy in Budapest, but in the headquarters of the CIA in Langley . Nate sees through Dominika's plan and confirms that Ivan is the mole, so that an exchange takes place. Dominika says goodbye to her uncle. Before Ivan reaches the Americans, he is shot by a Russian sniper. Dominika is taken away in the Russian helicopter.

In Moscow, Dominika is congratulated on the apparently successful completion of the mission, which means that nothing stands in the way of a career at SWR. The real mole Korchnoi remains undiscovered. The film ends with a call from Nate, in which her music by Grieg is played, which reminds them of their time together and her ballet performances.

production

The film is the fourth collaboration between director Francis Lawrence and the - not related - actress Jennifer Lawrence , after she appeared in The Hunger Games - Catching Fire (2013), as well as Mockingjay Part 1 (2014) and Part 2 (2015) had worked together.

The film was shot from January to May 2017 in Vienna , Budapest , London and Bratislava .

The film was released in the United States on March 2, 2018, and in Germany on March 1, 2018.

Trivia

The novel's writer, Jason Matthews, worked for the CIA for 33 years and began writing after retiring.

Reviews

The criticism's reactions were controversial. Cinema awarded the highest rating and called the film a “sophisticated spy thriller that captivates to the end”. Antje Wessels was also enthusiastic when the film was launched : “The noir thriller Red Sparrow is a cool, unpredictable trip into the shadowy world of international espionage, which is presented here unadorned with lots of nudity and even more brutal violence. Leading actress Jennifer Lawrence is simply outstanding. ”The evangelical epd film rated the film with only one of five possible stars and judged that apart from“ sadistic brutality and cynical sex ”,“ nothing else really attracts attention ”. The Catholic Film Service awarded three out of five stars and said Red Sparrow was a "cynical thriller that works very explicitly with the amalgamation of sex and violence". Jenni Zylka said at Spiegel online that the film “drowns in bad Bond clichés” and continues: “The director tells an old-fashioned Spy-vs-Spy story that only happens in an almost minimalist, strict manner and with absurd approaches distinguishes the ultra brutal performative violence scenes and the lack of humor from the more harmless old Bond films ”. Director Lawrence lets the protagonist “trudge powerlessly through stereotyped pseudo-Russian backdrops.” For the Berliner Morgenpost , the film “is by no means sensational or voyeuristic. He never becomes clumsy or exploitative. This is ensured by the dialog-strong storyline in these two and a half hours, the constantly new surprising twists and turns of the story and the all excellent actors. "

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Certificate of Release for Red Sparrow . Voluntary self-regulation of the film industry (PDF). Template: FSK / maintenance / type not set and Par. 1 longer than 4 characters
  2. ↑ Database of Edgar Awards Winners of the National Office of Mystery Writers of America, New York , accessed January 15, 2019
  3. ↑ "Red Sparrow 2" Is the sequel to the spy thriller coming? Report on the Kino.de portal from March 1, 2018, accessed on January 15, 2018
  4. ↑ Bernhard Steiner: 'Red Sparrow': Jennifer Lawrence shoots spy thriller in Vienna. TV-Media , May 18, 2017, accessed February 6, 2018 .
  5. ^ Budapest: Jennifer Lawrence gets into a bar conflict and pours beer over her fan. Stern , September 16, 2017, accessed February 6, 2018 .
  6. ^ Official author page of the publishing house Simon & Schuster on Jason Matthews , accessed on January 22, 2019
  7. ↑ CINEMA Online: Red Sparrow . In: CINEMA Online . ( cinema.de [accessed on May 4, 2018]).
  8. ↑ Filmstarts: The filmstarts review of Red Sparrow. Retrieved May 4, 2018 .
  9. ↑ epd film No. 3/2018, p. 72
  10. ↑ Red Sparrow , in: film-dienst , accessed April 2, 2018
  11. ↑ Jenni Zylka : Torture, oh torture , in: Spiegel online from March 2, 2018, accessed on April 2, 2018
  12. ↑ Peter E. Müller: Seductive fighting machine: "Red Sparrow" . ( Morgenpost.de [accessed on May 4, 2018]).