This Wednesday I had the chance to attend 2 film screenings: First, the violent action crime, thriller, The Protégé, and second the mystery, sci-fi, romance Reminiscence. Of the 2 I prefer The Protégé. I don’t know if that is saying much but if you are looking for an action movie with a kick-butt lead character you could do worse than Maggie Q in The Protégé.

The Protégé is directed by Martin Campbell who is most well known for his Bond movies like GoldenEye and Casino Royale. Here he has Maggie Q in the lead as an assassin who is asked to look into a mysterious disappearance and then it becomes a revenge story when someone she loves is threatened.

Samuel L Jackson plays her mentor who saves her from a traumatic childhood in Vietnam and they basically have a father/daughter dynamic. Their relationship helps soften Maggie Q’s character and gives the action stakes because she doesn’t feel invincible even when racing through scores of bullets unscathed.

Michael Keaton and Maggie Q also have chemistry. She’s the assassin and he’s the hit-man sent in by the criminal underworld to stop her. Their sexy repertoire is what you want in a movie like this.

Make no mistake The Protégé is an extremely violent movie with lots of brutal action. I wish that more of it had been hand-to-hand instead of with guns. It might be more shocking with guns but it’s less interesting to watch than martial arts/fighting.

The movie also starts to feel repetitive and has a major plot twist that is difficult to believe even for a movie like this. I don’t see many movies like this but my guess is others will call it tired and ‘we’ve seen it all before’ and they are probably correct. I’ve never seen movies like John Wick so The Protégé probably feels fresher to me than it might for others.

The reason to see The Protégé is Maggie Q. She’s awesome and I hope this is a jumping off point for more action roles in her career. We could use more female action stars like her especially being part Vietnamese.

She rocks. The movie is just fine if you can stomach the violence.

6 out of 10

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