VIOLET & DAISY (2011)

Genre: Drama
Director: Geoffrey Fletcher
Cast: Alexis Bledel, Saoirse Ronan, James Gandolfini, Jean-Baptiste, Danny Trejo
RunTime: 1 hr 28 mins
Rating: NC-16 (Violence)
Released By: Cathay-Keris Films and InnoForm Media
Official Website: http://violetanddaisyfilm.com/
 
Opening Day: 29 August 2013 

Synopsis: Violet (Alexis Bledel) and Daisy (Saoirse Ronan) are a pair of gum-cracking teenage assassins who casually snuff out crime figures in New York City, distracted only by the fact that a concert by their favourite pop idol Barbie Sunday has suddenly been cancelled. Determined to raise cash for some Barbie Sunday dresses, the duo takes on a new hit job targeting a mysterious loner (James Gandolfini) who leads them into an unexpected odyssey of self-examination and catapults the junior enforcers into a world beyond Barbie Sunday and bullets for pay. …

Movie Review:

Violet & Daisy is a comedy-drama helmed by first-time director Geoffrey Fletcher, winner of the 2010 Oscar for Writing (Adapted Screenplay) for the movie Precious: Based on the Novel "Push" by Sapphire. Alexis Bledel (Gilmore Girls, Sin City) stars as a contract killer named Violet, whose beautiful but often blank visage masks her ruthlessness in mowing down her targets. Her partner Daisy, played by Saoirse Ronan (The Lovely Bones, The Host), is less experienced, not just with the job but with life in general, leading Violet to worry about the future possibility of her being tried as an adult at her 18th birthday celebration. Plausibility is left at the door once you understand that the world they live in doesn’t play by the rules of reality: in the opening scene both girls charge into an apartment, dressed as nuns delivering pizza, and empty their gun cartridges on a group of hapless men. They shoot with their eyes closed, reload with calm efficiency, and leave the dead bodies behind without consequence. Silencers were not used, but of course, that’s not an issue.

The girls have no modus operandi beyond breaking, entering and shooting, which has worked well so far in their bid to earn enough for coveted Barbie Sunday dresses. They complete their hits and go home to their apartment; jumping on their queen-sized bed and playing the sort of games nine-year-olds do at playgrounds. But they’re given an assignment to kill a thief that turns this rosy picture on its head. The pair accidentally fall asleep on their target Michael’s (James Gandolfini, best known for The Sopranos) couch, and he winds up feeding them cookies and milk, sparking an unexpected friendship.

It’s in the last third of the show where the leads’ emotional psyches are explored. Fuelled by the sharing of personal revelations, the interplay between Daisy and Michael in his apartment works because of commendable turns from award-winning actors Ronan and Gandolfini. Both are able to subtly invoke shades of emotion that lend the film much-needed intensity, with Gandolfini in particular effortlessly leading with his sensitive take on a man who is simply trying his best. Initially appearing insipid, Daisy unveils herself to be made of sterner stuff, a streetwise young woman who thinks quickly on her feet.

Bledel’s Violet is easily the feistiest of the trio, with an actual backstory and an opportunity to experience life outside the apartment. She has a history of trauma and repressed hurt, but the film appears to deign further exploration of her pain beneath itself, beyond simple scenes of her breaking down delicately by the dumpster and waking from a nightmare. There is no resolution; nobody tries to solve anything with sense or logic. The problems incredulously resolve themselves, because this is the type of reality Violet and Daisy is set in.

The cinematography by Vanja Cernjul is aesthetically pleasing: every frame is a beautiful photograph, with the colours of summer and autumn pieced together to evoke an otherworldly feel that is also somehow nostalgic. The soundtrack is essential in creating this emotion, none more so than at a turning point towards the end where Sarah McLachlan’s instrumental piece Last Dance is used to excellent effect.

Released two years after a screening at the Toronto International Film Festival, this tongue-in-cheek affair is mostly an exercise in patience, despite lasting only slightly over one and a half hours. The girls are a little too childlike to take seriously, in turn trivializing the whole film. Although it had the potential to go beyond the fluff into deeper waters, the overall effect is instead a faint reminder of Zack Snyder’s 2011 action-fantasy Sucker Punch: while nowhere as exploitative, it is similarly vacant.

Movie Rating:

(Despite being buoyed by the acting prowess of Saoirse Ronan and James Gandolfini, Violet & Daisy never manages to hit its mark)

Review by Wong Keng Hui