Birds of Prey (and the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn) is a 2020 American superhero film based on the DC Comics team Birds of Prey. It is the eighth film in the DC Extended Universe and a follow-up to Suicide Squad (2016). It was directed by Cathy Yan and written by Christina Hodson, and it stars Margot Robbie, Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Jurnee Smollett-Bell, Rosie Perez, Chris Messina, Ella Jay Basco, Ali Wong, and Ewan McGregor. The film follows Harley Quinn as she joins forces with Helena Bertinelli, Dinah Lance, and Renee Montoya to save Cassandra Cain from Gotham City crime lord Black Mask.
Robbie, who also served as producer, pitched the idea for Birds of Prey to Warner Bros. in 2015. The film was announced in May 2016, with Hodson being hired to write the script that November, followed by Yan signing on to direct in April 2018. The majority of the cast and crew were confirmed by December 2018. Principal photography lasted from January to April 2019 in Downtown Los Angeles, parts of the Arts District, Los Angeles, and soundstages at Warner Bros. Studios in Burbank, California. Additional filming took place in September 2019.
Birds of Prey is the first DCEU film and the second DC Films production to be rated R by the Motion Picture Association of America. The film had its world premiere in Mexico City on January 25, 2020, and was theatrically released in the United States in IMAX, Dolby Cinema, and 4DX on February 7, 2020. It grossed $201 million worldwide, making it the fourth highest-grossing film of 2020.[7] The film received praise from critics for its visual style, Yan's direction and the performances of Robbie and McGregor, but criticism for Hodson's screenplay.
Cast:
Margot Robbie as Harleen Quinzel / Harley Quinn
Mary Elizabeth Winstead as Helena Bertinelli / The Huntress
Jurnee Smollett-Bell as Dinah Lance / Black Canary
Rosie Perez as Renee Montoya
Chris Messina as Victor Zsasz
Ella Jay Basco as Cassandra Cain
Ali Wong as Ellen Yee
Ewan McGregor as Roman Sionis / Black Mask
Additionally, Steven Williams portrays Captain Patrick Erickson, Montoya's superior at the GCPD; Dana Lee portrays Doc, Quinn's friend who owns a Taiwanese restaurant; François Chau portrays Mr. Keo, a rival crime boss of Sionis; Derek Wilson portrays Tim Munroe, a GCPD detective; Matt Willig portrays Happy, previously a henchman who worked for the Joker and for Stefano Galante; and whose face was tattooed by Quinn and the Joker; and Bojana Novakovic portrays Erika Manson, a night club patron who gets harassed by Sionis. Charlene Amoia and Paul Lasa respectively portray Maria and Franco Bertinelli, the mother and father of Helena; Robert Catrini portrays Stefano Galante, the mob boss who killed the Bertinelli family. The Joker appears in the film, through animated-special effects during a flashback sequence, as well as through the combined use of archive footage of Jared Leto from Suicide Squad and a body-double, Johnny Goth, on set. These techniques were used because Leto was not available during filming. A still photograph of Jai Courtney as George "Digger" Harkness / Captain Boomerang also appears on a wall in the Gotham City Police Department.
Plot:
After the Enchantress' defeat, the Joker breaks up with Harley Quinn, throwing her out on the streets of Gotham City. She is taken in by Doc, the owner of a Taiwanese restaurant, and recovers from her relationship by cutting her hair, adopting a spotted hyena (whom she names after Bruce Wayne), and taking up roller derby.
One night, Harley gets drunk at a nightclub owned by Roman Sionis and cripples his driver after said driver insults her. She meets burlesque singer Dinah Lance, who later rescues an intoxicated Harley from an attempted abduction. Roman is impressed by Dinah's skills and appoints her as his new driver. The next night, Harley blows up the Ace Chemicals plant as a way to publicly announce her and Joker's breakup. Meanwhile, GCPD Detective Renee Montoya investigates a series of mob killings carried out by a crossbow-wielding vigilante. Finding Harley's necklace at the scene of the Ace Chemicals explosion, Montoya notes that Harley is in danger without the Joker's protection. She approaches Dinah about being an informant on Roman for them, but Dinah rejects the offer.
Roman sends Dinah and his sadistic right-hand-man Victor Zsasz to retrieve a diamond embedded with the account numbers to the fortune of the Bertinelli crime family, who were massacred years ago. Young pickpocket Cassandra "Cass" Cain steals the diamond from Zsasz and swallows it after she is arrested. Harley, fleeing from Montoya and several other people she had wronged in the past, is captured by Roman's men. Zsasz informs Roman that Cassandra has the diamond, and Dinah warns Montoya about the situation. As Roman prepares to have Harley killed, she offers to recover the diamond for him. Roman agrees but also places a bounty on Cassandra. Breaking into the GCPD with a variety of firework-inspired non-lethal grenade launcher rounds, Harley frees Cassandra and the pair escape.
After escaping, Harley and Cassandra bond while hiding out at the former's apartment. Doc is approached for information by the "crossbow killer", who is revealed to be Helena Bertinelli. Having survived her family's massacre and becoming trained as an assassin, Helena has been targeting each of the gangsters responsible for her family's murders, preferring the moniker of "The Huntress". Quinn's apartment is later bombed by criminals looking for Cassandra, and Doc sorrowfully reveals that he sold Harley out. Harley calls Roman and offers to turn Cassandra over in exchange for his protection, agreeing to meet at an abandoned amusement park. Dinah notifies Montoya of the rendezvous, but her betrayal is noticed by Zsasz, who informs Roman. A devastated Roman dons his ritualistic mask from which he gets his villainous nickname, "Black Mask".
At the park, Montoya confronts Harley, but Harley knocks her out of a window. Zsasz arrives and tranquilizes Harley before holding Dinah at gunpoint, but he is killed by Helena, who reveals Zsasz was the last of her family's killers. Montoya returns and a stand-off ensues, until they realize Roman has arrived with a small army of masked criminals, known collectively as the False Face Society. Using Quinn's old gear, the makeshift team successfully withstand and repel their attack. During the battle, Cassandra is captured by Roman, while Dinah reveals her metahuman ability of supersonic-level screaming, defeating an additional number of mobsters aligned with Roman. Harley gives chase on roller skates, and with assistance from Helena, the pair pursue Roman. At a nearby pier, the final confrontation occurs. Roman prepares to kill Cassandra, but she pulls the ring from a grenade that she slipped in his jacket after taking it from Harley's weapons chest earlier. Harley throws Roman off the pier just before the grenade detonates and kills him.
In the aftermath of destroying Roman's criminal empire, Montoya quits the GCPD. With the money within the accounts hidden inside the diamond, she joins Dinah and Helena in establishing a team of vigilantes – the Birds of Prey. Harley and Cassandra escape, selling the diamond itself to a pawnshop and starting their own contract killing business.
In a post-credits audio sequence, Harley is about to reveal a secret about Batman, but the film ends mid-sentence.
The Verdict:
(Laughs) I'm going to get shit for this, but I honestly fell asleep watching this in the theater when it first came out. Since I missed a good portion of the film, I figured it would be best that I watch until the film was available digitally for I could re-watch in its full capacity.
 |
| Still looks trashy to me. |
It's the feminist bullshit like that is what makes me shake my head in terms of the reception and dick-riding or rather, vagina pleasing, to this film. The costumes didn't need to be revealing to still be contributors to the male gaze. Even Laura Mulvey herself would shake her head at Robbie misusing any reference to her work. There's still several gratuitous moments of the film that cater to portraying these women sexually. So that argument about this film is so much different with a female director in charge is completely invalid right there.
That being said, I thought it was comical from the early reactions to this film from the angry feminists who claimed that you required a vagina to like this film. Seriously, what the fuck? I don't need a fucking vagina to point out that this film was mediocre. Sure, there's some glimpses of something that could have been much, MUCH better, but it ultimately falls short and feels under-utilized, especially for most of these marquee comic book characters involved.
There's some VERY noticeable reshoots in this film too as you could tell the difference between the John Wick-esque fight scenes and the not-so brilliantly choreographed other fight sequences. You cannot watch this film and tell that there's some scenes that aren't like the other in terms of the action. I don't understand why there was a decision to reshoot some fight sequences, but keep others in that were just flat out boring as hell to watch.
Characters
Harley Quinn/Harleen Quinzel (Margot Robbie)
It's sad really when the first reactions to this film weren't met to Warner Bros.' expectations and they had to rename the film Harley Quinn and the Birds of Prey in most markets. Margot Robbie was financially backing this film, so that couldn't be helped, along with the fact that she's the most recognizable and easily the most popular character out of the film's cast.
I can't really say that I liked Robbie's Harley Quinn here more than her previous performance in Suicide Squad, especially after seeing the version of the character presented in DC Universe's animated series of the same name, voiced by Kaley Cuoco. Her Boston accent feels a tad more forced here than it was in the previous film, but that's just something that I have come to expect from all of these actresses that have portrayed this character following Arleen Sorkin in Batman: The Animated Series. I still feel like this another "audition reel" for Margot Robbie landing a bigger part for this character in a much better film (and a better cinematic universe to boot) than this.
Roman Sionis/Black Mask (Ewan McGregor)
Between animation and comics, I have seen multiple iterations and different takes on this particular Batman villain and I have to say that McGregor's take is definitely something. It's not bad, but I think a common theme that plagues a lot of these human villains in the DCEU, ranging from Lex Luthor (Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice) to The Joker (Suicide Squad) now Roman Sionis/Black Mask, is that they border on the eccentric and unorthodox to the point of bizarre and silly, rather than truly terrifying entities as they should portrayed as from the source material. It's a darn shame too as I thought McGregor was growing into the role in the third act, but Sionis is killed off before we could seen how McGregor would have evolved the character further in another DCEU appearance down the road.I think the biggest disservice this film did to this character was killing him off in the last act before he could get his iconic mask grafted to his face and we could have gotten the traditional psychopath that this character was notorious for being in the comics. Instead, he is reduced to a whiny, spoiled brat who is too prissy to get his hands dirty most of the time, but yet, everyone is afraid of this guy from all of his temper tantrums in public.
Victor Zsasz (Chris Messina)
Zsasz comes across as a bigger waste as Shades in the second season of Luke Cage from Marvel Studios' Netflix television properties. He seems to have a homoerotic relationship with Roman Sionis that's never really fleshed out nor explored properly. He just seems to be highly protective of his employer to the point of borderline infatuation.Huntress kills him off unceremoniously in the film's final act and doesn't offer Sionis any screen time to grieve his most loyal henchman. It felt like such a massive waste for this character. Much like Cassandra Cain (who we're about to discuss shortly), they could have named Sionis' lead henchman anything else and not waste this character.
Cassandra Cain (Ella Jay Basco)
What a massive waste of a character. The writers of this film could have named this character anything BUT Cassandra Cain for a warmer reception from comic book fans. This one decision alone has shot the DC Extended Universe in the foot for yet another blunder, much like Mercy Graves (Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice) and countless other "throwaway" characters in this cinematic universe to date. I swear, the folks at Warner Bros. and DC Comics' film divisions have no sense of long-term planning with these films.By the end of this film, Cassandra is made out to be Harley's "sidekick" or rather protege as they run away together with the money they made from the Bertinelli diamond. Her past with the League of Shadows and potential to be a future member of the Bat Family isn't even mentioned nor established in any shape nor form in this film. This film took absolutely no regard to this character's established history and just made her a blank slate and only exists in the DC Extended Universe as Cassandra Cain in name only. I guess we'll never see Orphan in a live-action Batman film unless this cinematic universe is rebooted with different people involved.
I don't fault Ella Jay Basco for the role as she did the best what she could with this script and it didn't bother me that this iteration of Cassandra Cain wasn't mute either as I knew that going in from seeing the initial trailers for this film. The number one thing that pissed me off about including this character in this film was that there wasn't even a minor nod or anything here to show that the writers had any clue that this character had ties to Batman lore. You could've name her ANYTHING but Cassandra Cain to avoid pissing comic book faithfuls off.
Renee Montoya (Rosie Perez)
I'm sure most people are more familiar with Renee Montoya from her appearances in Batman: The Animated Series rather than her lesbian, true to comics iteration presented here. I grew fond of this character from DC Comics' New 52 graphic novels (where she would take over the mantle of The Question) and in the Injustice: Gods Among Us comics adaptation, namely her lesbian relationship with Batwoman and her own tenure into being a costumed heroine.Right off the bat, Harley (as the film's narrator) points out that Renee comes off as a parody of '80s cop movies and I couldn't unsee that for the duration of this film's runtime. From that moment on, Renee came off as a parody of a generic cop in any other one of these action films. I couldn't take her seriously from that fact, along with the fact that they got Rosie Perez of all people to portray this character. Her and Linda Hamilton (Terminator: Dark Fate) must be running for the Oscar for most irrelevant female to come back into relevancy in a mediocre film in 2019-2020.
(Laughs) At least she's still got a nice rack though...
In all seriousness though, Renee's character arc seems incomplete as she solves the case with Sionis, but she doesn't get the credit for it at all among her peers at GCPD, leading her to quit the force and join up with Huntress and Dinah to form the Birds of Prey. It would've been a better slap to the face of the men who tried to discredit her at every turn by slapping the Sionis case in their faces, but not giving her the last laugh so to speak didn't do anything for her character arc. She didn't get to arrest Sionis and no one knew about the Bertinelli diamond and all of that drama surrounding the case other than her, so it was all for nothing. You could say that she quit the force for a "higher calling" as a vigilante, but whatever at this point.
Helena Bertinelli/Huntress (Mary Elizabeth Winstead)
The recreation of the infamous murders of the Bertinelli family was well done, while simultaneously serving as the emotional catalyst for Helena's training as an assassin. They pretty much pegged her to be Batman but without his line he won't cross to kill. Instead, Huntress doesn't have any issue whatsoever with crossing that line to exact her revenge on those who murdered her family in cold blood.
I'm going to be completely honest. I couldn't take Huntress seriously at all in this film from start to finish. When she would open her mouth to speak, the only thing I could see and hear was Ramona Flowers from Scott Pilgrim vs. The World each and every time. It was bad enough that they gave her an abysmal costume to wear in this film too. She gets a more comics-accurate costume during the closing moments of the film, but it still didn't look very good in that regard either. I don't know what the fuck they were thinking with her costume here at all.
Any attempts to take this character serious are diluted by the fact that once she pairs up with Harley and the other Birds of Prey, her serious nature is made out to be a complete joke, no matter how bad ass she comes across in combat. She got revenge by killing all of the men responsible for the murders of her family, but there wasn't much else to write home about her character arc. The tie-in with Sionis just felt tacked on at the last second in all honesty.
Dinah Lance/Black Canary (Jurnee Smollett-Bell)
Black Canary is a character that's traditionally portrayed as Caucasian blonde female, but I didn't have an issue with Jurnee Smollett-Bell being cast as racially diverse take on this character. I can't put my finger on it, but her character in this film is a tad muddled in terms of her direction. At the same time, she has the most "complete" character arc than anyone else in this film - other than Harley Quinn herself to an extent. She shows promise in the first half of the film, where she's content of making enough money to get by singing at Sionis' nightclub that was frequented by Harley Quinn and other shady individuals of Gotham City's criminal underworld. She was content with not getting involved in bringing those individuals to justice, as it was the same vigilante lifestyle that saw her mother get killed (something that Renee Montoya points out via exposition dialogue later in the film). What makes her stand out is no matter how much she tries to run away from that "responsibility" to use her powers for good, she finds herself being forced to answer that call time and time again. The first time was when Harley was about to be "taken advantage of" (read: more likely raped...) by that guy that picked her up at the nightclub during one of her drunken trysts and ready to load her into his van until Dinah stopped in her tracks and beat the shit out of him and his cohorts. Sionis notices her skills on display and employs her as his new driver and enforcer/bodyguard, much to her dismay. Her resolve to not get involved is pushed further by Renee Montoya approaching her about providing intel on Sionis' shady dealings after she reminds Dinah about her mother's heroic exploits.Dinah struggles to stay within the middle of either side (good and evil) at play here, only to find her hand forced into action once Cassandra Cain was put into the crossfire of Sionis' plans. She informed Montoya of Sionis' deal with Harley Quinn, but found herself still struggling to follow in her mother's footsteps as a heroine. It wasn't until these Birds of Prey were forced with their backs against the wall against Sionis' army that she finally made a stand. She used her signature sonic scream (metahuman ability) to incapacitate most of Sionis' men and finally stepped up as a true heroine. She was done running and hiding from her destiny and true calling. Out of all of the characters in this film, I loved the fact that her narrative was brought around full circle.
Narrative
The film focuses primarily on Harley Quinn chronicling her exploits following her break up with The Joker following the events of Suicide Squad. It should be clarified that this film goes out of its way to keep the ties and references to Suicide Squad to an absolute minimum as Warner Bros./DC Comics wanted to treat this film as it's own standalone feature. Harley Quinn recaps that relationship with a rather cute animation montage at the start of the film.
In an attempt to drown her sorrows away by drinking heavily and partying every night in Gotham City, Harley Quinn abuses her status as The Joker's (ex) girlfriend without fear of repercussions until she foolishly blows up the Ace Chemical Plant that was their beloved "hangout". This clues in everyone to their break up and puts Harley Quinn into the cross hairs of every maniac in Gotham City looking to get even with her or The Joker in some capacity. All of this chaos leads Harley Quinn onto the bad side of Roman Sionis after she broke his drivers' legs during one of her drunken trysts. When she was held at gun point, Harley pleads to curry a favor in the form of retrieving the lost Bertinelli diamond that was stolen by the pickpocket, Cassandra Cain. Cassandra just happened to get arrested for petty theft and swallowed the diamond before she was detained.
The rest of the film has each of the main characters pursuing either Harley Quinn or Cassandra Cain in hopes of retrieving the diamond or cornering Sionis for they could land him in jail after collecting enough evidence.
- Dinah and Renee happen to cross paths with Cassandra out of pure coincidence.
- Renee sees her as a regular at GCPD being brought in for petty theft and pickpocketing
- Dinah meets her on the way home as they happen to live in the same apartment building
- Huntress meets all four women after following Zsasz trail to fulfill her own revenge for the murders of her entire family
- She kills Zsasz and was ready to leave until Renee points out that Sionis was the mastermind behind the plot to murder her entire family
- Harley was under the impression that Huntress was after her, due to bounty on her head by Sionis
- Sionis wants the diamond from Cassandra as it would give him complete financial control of Gotham City, even though he had enough power over the city as it is, even down to his moles in the GCPD
Huntress being involved is sheer coincidence since she had no ties to Sionis until Renee Montoya informed her that he was the one who staged her family's murder. With the dynamic between Renee and Dinah along with their unlikely partnership with Huntress, they could have taken down Sionis and Zsasz on their own without Harley's half-baked "let's work together" speech during the film's climax. On any other given day in Gotham City, those three women wouldn't beaten the shit out of Harley and along with Sionis' men.
I should mention that I watched that final fight sequence rolling my eyes at the sheer stupidity of how all of Sionis' henchmen are fighting these women with melee weapons or hand-to-hand instead of running into Amusement Mile with guns. They wised up when they had the women forced into the choke point as they were filing out of the main entrance, but that proved to be an excuse to resolve Dinah's character arc by making her use her powers in this film for the first time. Seeing that I felt like War Machine in Ironman 2, "How about next time you just lead with that?"
Harley confronts Sionis one-on-one and doesn't even beat him on her own, but by the odd chance that Cassandra Cain picked up one of Harley's hand grenades and pulled the pin at the last second before Harley knocks him off the pier to explode to his own fiery demise. I repeat - that was such a complete waste of that character. With Sionis dead, the five ladies go out together and bond over tacos (yeah... really) until Harley and Cassandra dupe them to take the Bertinelli diamond for themselves. Renee, Huntress, and Dinah form a new alliance as the trio of vigilantes dubbed the Birds of Prey, aimed to taking down other criminal exploits in Gotham City like Sionis' own. Harley takes Cassandra under her wing in a sense as they ride out to make a life of their own with the fortune they've acquired from the Bertinelli diamond. I get that this is supposed to be like "redemption" story of sorts for Harley coming out onto her own away from The Joker, but I can't say that this journey for her did anything for me.
That's well and all that she has the kid (Cassandra Cain) to tag along with her and fill the empty void that Mistah J left in her life after he dumped her, but this doesn't feel like an independence story like it comes across as it should. Don't get me wrong. I'm all for female empowerment and this film has a lot of moments where that is in full swing, but as an overall package, it doesn't feel very significant as a whole across the board. Five women down in their luck happen to cross paths and join forces against the common threat of Roman Sionis - I can buy that narrative for sure, but getting to that point is pretty muddled up with a lot of unnecessary red tape. Not to mention, there's Harley's cringe-worthy "rallying the troops" speech at the film's climax.
A few minor changes would have made this work better in my eyes. First of all, rename the kid anything BUT Cassandra Cain as that leaves that character on the table for the DCEU could bring her into the Bat Family in this continuity properly down the road. Keep Renee, Dinah, and Huntress' stories roughly the same, but add that they were getting tipped off by a mysterious informant throughout the film, who refers to themselves as "Oracle". Savvy comic book fans will know where I'm going with this. A mid-credits scene can reveal Oracle to be Barbara Gordon, Commissioner Gordon's wheelchair-bound daughter who has been monitoring Sionis' activities and looking for the means to take him down before they all came into the picture. Dinah, Renee, and Huntress can agree to continue working together and that's the proper start to the Birds of Prey. Sionis isn't killed off, but he's stuck in jail for a while from all of the evidence that's stacked against him from Renee's detective work, the evidence at the crime scene(s), and Oracle's own networking. Harley can still bond with the kid and all that, with the main change being that she allows the diamond to be returned to the proper authorities. Harley's true intentions are made clear after she tucks the kid in bed at her apartment, only to go out to steal the Bertinelli diamond for herself from police custody. This is where the film ends on a big cliffhanger where she bumps into Poison Ivy breaking into the police station for the very same thing. That way the film ends with a tease of what is to come with Ivy and Harley potentially teaming up while simultaneously laying a proper foundation for the Birds of Prey in this continuity.
But yeah... That's just my two cents on how I would have tweaked this film.
Watch It or Don't Bother?
I'm still laughing at the comments from the first week of this film's theatrical debut going along the lines of "you need a vagina to understand this film" along with Margot Robbie herself saying that people need to read the comics to get this film. I laughed hysterically and said, "Bitch, please." It's painfully obvious that those who were involved with the creation of this film were looking at comic book covers and was looking for "cool" ideas to shoehorn into this film with little knowledge of how these characters should be presented in any capacity.
If you like Harley Quinn (especially after her live-action debut in Suicide Squad), then it's going to be a no-brainer that you are going to want to see this. For everyone else who is already on the fence leery about everything that the DCEU has put on the table after Man of Steel, I say don't go out of your way to see this. It'll be on free television sooner more than later.
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