Tyler Rake (Chris Hemsworth) is a fearless black market mercenary with nothing left to lose when his skills are solicited to rescue the kidnapped son of an imprisoned international crime lord.
This is a fake movie, surely. This is a parody whipped up — in no more two seconds, barely requiring any thought at all — in order to highlight the complete and empty absurdity of what action movies have become. It has to be. Doesn’t it?
Except Extraction is real, that’s the actual description of it, and it’s new on Netflix all over the planet.
Every cliché imaginable has been poured into the “character” of Tyler *snort* Rake: He’s suicidal. He drinks too much. He is haunted by gauzy memories of a nicer life. And yet he is also practically superhuman: recklessly yet successfully audacious; gifted with hyperendurance and seeming precognition in the face of a literal army of opponents coming at him from every angle; able to pick himself up from *checks notes* getting rammed by a speeding car to just keep going.
Rake is the “man who does this sort of thing” called in when Ovi (Rudhraksh Jaiswal), the teenaged son of a drug kingpin, is kidnapped for ransom by another, rival drug kingpin, and needs to be rescued. The kid is being held somewhere in… oh, let’s say Dhaka, Bangladesh. It could have been anywhere suitably “exotic” where a white savior like Rake can do his thing among brown people either dishonorable, inept, or downright malevolent; in the graphic novel Ciudad upon which this is based, it’s Ciudad del Este, Paraguay. Here in Dhaka, the sky is an apocalyptic yellow and the cops are all corrupt, and also — conveniently — there’s a guy who owes Rake who can be called upon in a moment of need.
Who are we rooting for? Everyone is awful here, sociopathic but otherwise blank slates of testosterone-fueled rage. Extraction tries, in the opening scene, to generation some sympathy for the kidnap victim — poor little rich kid, lonely and isolated, etc — but he’s never anything more than a human macguffin to be tossed around by the opposing forces.
Rake? Nah. Hemsworth (Men in Black: International, Bad Times at the El Royale) is way more plausible, way more vulnerable, as Marvel’s demigod Thor. Which isn’t Hemsworth’s fault: he has absolutely nothing to work with here. (The script is by multi-Marvel director Joe Russo [Avengers: Endgame, Captain America: Civil War], who cowrote the graphic novel with Ande Parks and his creative partner and brother Anthony Russo.) He’s a finer actor than he is often given credit for, yet his robust physicality is never less than ridiculously cartoonish here, and there’s not a lick of humor at play, either, something else that he’s sneakily terrific with. And the constant moping that Rake is allegedly engaging in is horrific, though probably not in any way that’s intended. When the shit hits the fan and the mission goes sideways, he is instructed by his handler (Golshifteh Farahani: Pirates of the Caribbean: Salazar’s Revenge, Finding Altamira) to kill the kid himself, because they won’t be getting their fee, and the money is the only reason they’re there. (Rake is a mercenary, recall, not any kind of cop or soldier or other brand of Good Guy.) There is no suggestion that cutting his losses like this isn’t an ordinary part of an ordinary job for Rake, and the movie makes a halfhearted attempt to mine a bit of disgusting suspense from this “dilemma” of Rake’s. Will he dump the kid? Are those sun-dappled memories of a little blond boy that haunt him the only thing stopping him? Never mind a hero; this isn’t even the stuff of an anti-hero.
(Farahani, by the way, is the only woman in the film. Though the gender dynamics of Extracted could be worse: in Ciudad, the kidnap victim is a young woman.)
Just when you’re wondering whether banal meathead Tyler Rake (Rake? really?) beating up and killing a nonstop parade of disposable brown guys — but the brown guys are all brutal so it’s okay, okay? — is all Extraction has going for it, we get to the Big Chase scene, and you realize that this is all anyone involved had a hard-on for. For a solid ten minutes, Sam Hargrave — a stunt coordinator on big-budget action flicks (Atomic Blonde, The Accountant), including some Russo Brothers projects, making his feature debut as *checks notes* director — zooms his camera in and out of cars and trucks, up and through apartment buildings, and off roofs and into streets, as Rake and the kid run from Even Worse guys. It’s one of those seemingly uncut sequences that can, theoretically, get you caught up in intense action thrills… but that only works if we care about the people in the middle of them. In Extraction, it’s nothing more than soulless technical wankery — look, ma, what I can do! — with no humanity powering it at all.
You’ll probably try to discredit me by calling and -ist word; so I won’t take too much of your time. But I just have to say that:
Maryann, sincerely, your website is now a parody of itself. It’s already come to a point where your cognitive dissonance is astounding. Let me demonstrate this by comparing your rhetoric regarding two films about sociopaths–one about a man (EXTRACTION–0 Stars), the other about a woman (BIRDS OF PREY–5 Stars):
1.) EXTRACTION: “And yet he is also practically superhuman: recklessly yet successfully audacious; gifted with hyperendurance and seeming precognition in the face of a literal army of opponents coming at him from every angle; able to pick himself up from *checks notes* getting rammed by a speeding car to just keep going.”
BIRDS OF PREY: ” as bone-deep satisfying as it is to see a wronged woman blow up some urban infrastructure as a response to being dumped by the official Worst Boyfriend Ever”
2.) EXTRACTION: “Everyone is awful here, sociopathic but otherwise blank slates of testosterone-fueled rage. ”
BIRDS OF PREY: “This movie could not be more fantastical, what with its depiction of not one, not two, not three, but four women who resort to outrageously violent sprees ”
3.) EXTRACTION: “but he’s never anything more than a human macguffin to be tossed around by the opposing forces.”
BIRDS OF PREY: “There’s also rising badass Ella Jay Basco as a teenage girl who needs their protection: she’s caught up with macguffin to the point where she’s a bit of a macguffin herself.”
4.) EXTRACTION: “Tyler Rake (Rake? really?) beating up and killing a nonstop parade of disposable brown guys — but the brown guys are all brutal so it’s okay, okay? ”
BIRDS OF PREY: “Anyone who loves these kinds of movies but says they don’t need to see this particular one is lying, or a misogynist pig” (BY the way, and I can prove this with screenshots, Harley co. beat the shit out of tons of brown men in this film and emerge with NOT ONE BRUISE).
Take note; both of these are fictional films based on fictional source materials. Your rhetoric has made it clear that you have a deep hatred for men. Your double-standards–and downright SELECTIVE assessment of what constitutes of good/bad are clear. Selective logic isn’t logic–you may very well get angry and delete this comment; but I won’t be surprised.
This is just SAD seeing this from someone as experienced as you. :-/
You’re very sweet. Thanks for your thoughtful commentary! Why not support my Patreon? https://www.patreon.com/maryannjohanson
Here’s the key paragraph:
You seem to think that the most important word in the paragraph is “testosterone,” but that’s not the only distinction between the two movies. The characters in Birds of Prey have redeeming qualities and complex personalities. Some of them may be awful people, but they’re awful in different ways at the beginning and the end of the movie, because they change and grow over the course of the film.
MaryAnn thought that the characters in Extraction were “blank slates“ at the beginning of the film and remained blank slates at the end. They weren’t even charming blank slates, and for her, that made the movie excruciating to watch. You may disagree, when and if you see the films, but she’s made a case for her point of view.
Aww, you’re giving Jaz too much credit. Jaz does not understand — and does not WANT to understand — how a movie’s tone is a huge part of how and why it works, or doesn’t. And Jaz does not understand — and does not WANT to understand — the larger cultural context in which movies exist, and in which they are told, how they are reactions to other stories and to prevailing attitudes, the difference between punching up and punching down, what makes something satirical versus upholding the status quo.
I mean, just for starters…
I’m not going to debate with a rude, sarcastic person. So this is going to be my last comment: Instead of addressing my comment, you immediately try to discredit me.
I understand the cultural context just fine, thank you very much. But humor me–what do I NOT know (I’m anticipating a scoff and/or a “you’re cute” as a reply)?
IF you’re trying to pass BOP off as smart satire then all I can tell you is this: BOTH films feature men getting beaten up–it’s just that the one you deem to be “transgressive” features unrealistic battle scenes of women beating up men.
And NO, I’m not saying this because I think women are weak (I don’t)–I’m saying this because:
– When Harley fights in the police station; NONE of them have guns; none attack her with fatal weapons.
– Whenever a group of men fight her, they run at her ONE BY ONE.
– The only reason Roman Sionis is in this film is to make someone look more sociopathic than Harley (thus, excusing her sociopathy).
Also, to Daniel’s point: I fully acknowledge that BOP had more interesting characters than Extraction. But Everything I’ve detailed above are direct quotes from the reviewer. Instead of actually arguing, she instantly went on to try and invalidate me by being sarcastic and framing me as someone ignorant.
Look, all the evidence to support my claim is in this thread: all you can do now is continue to try discrediting me to make me look bad, and to make you SOUND smart. Sucks to suck. Have a good one.
For many movie lovers, films (and art in general) don’t work like toasters or can openers. You cannot check off a list of specs to compare how well they do what they do. This is the same trap that some who criticize game reviews fall into. I’m sure you’ve seen comments along the lines of:
“But that other game was also a post-apocalyptic open-world third-person shooter with zombies, and you gave it a 9, how come this game (that I happen to like) only got a 7?
One could just as well say, “Bram Stoker’s Dracula has a sex scene between a vampire and a brunette that you said you liked, but Twilight also has a sex scene between a vampire and a brunette that you said was silly? And how come in Bram Stoker’s Dracula you thought a vampire climbing the wall was scary and cool, but you didn’t think the werewolf in Twilight climbing the tree was awesome too? I mean they’re practically the same movie!”
Surely, there have been cases where one adaptation of a work/character works for you and one doesn’t? Schumacher’s Batman and Robin vs. Burton’s Batman Returns? Surely cases in which the sequel to a movie doesn’t work as well for you (Zoolander 2, Anchorman 2, Rise of Skywalker, etc.)? There must be covers of your favorite songs that you hate. All those pairs are far, far more similar than these two films and yet a person can have different reactions to them, and another person can feel just the opposite and be just as valid in their critique because art is subjective.
For example, I absolutely hate John Wick 3 and enjoyed John Wick 1. Both have over the top action and silly plots, but I find the action and plot in John Wick 3 unbearably stupid and annoyingly monotonous. A friend of mine feels exactly the opposite. We are both correct. Of course your reasons make sense to you, but MA is not wrong.
There is another factor that MA addressed. Blacksploitation and Kung Fu flicks were extremely popular in African American neighborhoods in the 70’s, much more than higher budget mainstream action movies with similar plots. Setting aside the artistic merits of these films, which were often significant and as we established highly subjective, people like to see themselves represented, and as MA stated, punching up is typically more admirable, productive, novel, and entertaining than punching down.
Your dislike of modern feminism and anger/insecurity about someone having different tastes than you is the emotional core of your response, just as MA’s support of feminism is the emotional core of hers. Her rationalization acknowledges this core and explains and supports it; however, your rationalization is a facade attempting to conceal your core. You had a reaction, then tried to explain it with preconceptions about modern feminism after the fact instead of examining its source.
We all do it when we forget to slow down and listen carefully to each other and ourselves. In fact, 95% of internet arguments are two angry, frightened, emotional people yelling past each other and papering over their feelings with regurgitated rationalizations. Four percent is people rambling off their favorite talking points in a blissfully oblivious, supercilious bubble like yours truly, and the last 1% are people making interesting points clearly and concisely like MA. The world is grayer and fuzzier than our feelings (or maybe this is all part of the gray agenda =).
“But that other game was also a post-apocalyptic open-world third-person shooter with zombies, and you gave it a 9, how come this game (that I happen to like) only got a 7”
—This is an oversimplification of my comment. I’ve cited specific quotes from both reviews that demonstrate how the critic reviews two films–both of which have very similar ELEMENTS, and not individual scenes–but rates them differently for more or less the same thing. However, she uses the faulty blanket of today’s “””cultural context””” and tone to condone one, and condemn the other.
” I mean they’re practically the same movie!””
— The scenes I’ve cited from Maryann’s reviews are more specific: both films reduce a POC child to a McGuffin, both films have sociopaths who are condoned because there’s someone more evil in the story, both films depict tons of men getting beaten up–yet the more realistic one gets rated 0 because of the supposed cultural context?
“Your dislike of modern feminism and anger/insecurity about someone having different tastes than you is the emotional core of your response”
— AGAIN, and I am starting to see a trend here: you know nothing about me–I am a feminist. But of course, you’d rather be selective in logic, oversimplify what I say, and then attempt to use emotional appeals to paint me as a certain kind of person that the rest of the folks on this cite would normally disagree with.
“In fact, 95% of internet arguments are two angry, frightened, emotional people”
— You really want to go there? You aren’t interested in a debate. You’re interested in taking the points of anyone who sees a flaw in you and convincing yourself that they’re against modern feminism. You’re less interested in arguing and more interested in re-stating my points simplistically and assigning emotional appeals to them to convince you that I am the kind of person not worth speaking to.
They are nowhere near at all the same thing. You show your ignorance by insisting that they are.
Add as many quotation marks as you like. But you can’t argue it away.
I have 22+ years of argument here to back up my feminism. Where’s yours?
“I have 22+ years of argument here to back up my feminism. Where’s yours?”
Really? Because based on this comment section, here’s how you argue:
Someone: Your thought process is inconsistent and selective.
Maryann: *scoff* Hmph! It must be because you’re ignorant? Do you understand? NO! You refuse to understand! Troll!
Someone: I understand very well; what do I NOT understand?
Maryann: Fuck all the way off! I have no time to educate you! Ignorant! Ignorant! Ignorant! I PRESUME YOU ARE A MAN.
….I literally wish I was making this up.
You’re exhausting. People like you are exhausting. I have spent *years* here repeating myself over and over again. I’m done with it.
Perhaps I was too quick to judge you, and I have a habit of strawmanning for my own amusement – if you’re a feminist, I apologize for assuming otherwise. You have to admit your approach is very offputting and disrespectful though – you immediately accused MA of cognitive dissonance and a hatred of men by comparing out of context statements in two reviews of, once again, completely different films.
Her main beefs with this one seemed to be the lack of humanity, humor, and an abundance of cliches. Say what you will about BoP, the characters seem more interesting and human (as you yourself admit), it has a sense of humor, and it has a comparatively original structure and style despite a similar use of child Macguffin juggling.
I haven’t seen this movie, but I can tell from the reviews that the tone is also wildly different from Bop, to name one more major difference among many. My main point above stands though, even if you were comparing the reviews of two adaptations a single identical screenplay, there would be no justification to shout “cognitive dissonance” when similar scenes in each were received and rated differently. They. Are. Different. How many times has Hamlet been performed – identical scenes can work or not work depending on how they go about doing what they do and the particular tastes and biases of the viewer. To say nothing of comparing a gender-swapped performance of Hamlet to the original by claiming they are identical and should be judged identically? No critic in her or his right mind could do such a thing. Even if they personally felt no difference, the art is taking place within a social context that has to be acknowledged for the critique to hold any relevance or value for most readers.
Next time, when a review makes you angry enough to comment, you’ll be more effective with a less accusatory, “Aha! Gotcha! What do you say to this, man hater! You poor deluded fool! Looks like I win this round!” tone, and more of a “I enjoyed/did not enjoy this film, and here’s why. Some scenes and plot elements reminded me of similar ones in BoP. Here’s why they worked/didn’t work for me in each film, and after that nice respectful opening, maybe at the end a genuinely curious, “there was an idea in your review that I had a question about…” with no assumption that MA is obliged to spend her time addressing a list of grievances.
Otherwise, you’re just setting yourself up for a self-fulfilling prophecy of annoyance and deletion. No need to kick in the door and start blasting. Just imagine you’re going to a professional’s place of business in real life and introducing yourself.
Maybe you could try not feeding the troll?
Dude (assuming you *are* a dude, which I might be wrong about, but I suspect not): I am not your feminist mommy, and I have better ways to spend my time than educating you.
LOL. You came here to my site and dumped your ignorant shit, and now you’re hurt that I dismissed you with sarcasm? You can fuck all the way off.
Is this what modern feminism (assuming, because amanohyo used this term) is? Calling those you disagree with “trolls” and then showing how angry you are (profanity included!) when someone points out that your own logic is faulty at best?
You contradict yourself on this site, and I can only assume you contradict yourself in person. I bet you think we should #BelieveAllWomen even after your favorite woman, Hillary Clinton, has: defended and silenced her husband’s rape victims, defended the rapist of Kathy Shelton, wined and dined with Harvey Weinstein, and now, currently endorses newly accused Joe Biden.
And somehow *I* am the one who needs to be educated? Somehow *I* am the troll?
Instead of debating, Maryann, why don’t you just cuss at me more and call me an ignorant prick–feminism in a nutshell!
You’re an ignorant prick, and I invite you, once again, to fuck off.
Over on another thread, I had talked about updating the FlickFilosopher Bingo* card. I had no plans to actually do it,** because I could only come up with two new squares, “It’s not race, it’s class!” and “There are no original stories, so why complain that this movie is derivative?” But I just realized that I could fill up the other 23 squares by writing “This will be my last comment!” over and over again.
Anyway, I like this essay:
https://www.tor.com/2020/04/13/birds-of-prey-avengers-comic-book-violence-and-gender/
*I’m told that “Bingo” isn’t actually supposed to be capitalized, but I’m keeping the capital B in tribute to the dog.
**If this site gets enough comments to fill a third card, I’ll probably end up in a fetal position muttering, “We’re doomed. We’re all doomed.”
What a disgusting review written by a disgusting person. Fuckin hell lol
What’s disgusting about my review? What did you like about the film?
What a disgusing person to come onto a reviewer’s personal website just to insult them and their work. Didn’t your mother teach you any manners?
My mother taught me how to headbutt someone properly.
The reviewer is a twat.
Congrats on being banned.
Ignoring everything else, the bigger action scenes in Extraction are fantastic. Made by masters of their craft, from a purely technical standpoint. Just wish the rest of the movie was even decent.
I skipped to the long single take action sequence and enjoyed it, but only as a technical accomplishment. What’s also galling is that this kind of violent action is every bit as unrealistic as the 80’s action movies people now like to laugh at for their absurdity, but the difference is that a lot of 80’s action movies were fun, even if they were ideologically deranged. I’ll take the lunacy of Commando over this dreary nonsense.
Or a more recent comparison: Just last week I saw 2015’s SPL 2: A Time for Consequences. Like Extraction, it’s a brutally violent film featuring impossibly durable male leads (Wu Jing and Tony Jaa) involved in impossible fights, but the martial arts stylisation – where bodies in motion matter more than guns – and the refreshing sincerity with which the hugely melodramatic story is told, kept me riveted throughout (It also features the beautiful Max Zhang Jin as the villain. He’s amazing). Maybe I’m biased, but the better Chinese action movies still make US movies look like they’re moving in slow-motion.
For another counterpoint, something that does almost the opposite of Extraction is the Bollywood movie Dhoom 3, which features Aamir Khan and Abhishek Bachchan as robber vs cop running around Chicago, where white Americans are anonymous background figures. It makes a nice change to see the US treated as an “exotic” locale in which the Indian heroes can run amok. It also has some stunning musical numbers, which is something Extraction really needed. .
Perhaps I’m biased because one of the first movies I watched with one of my Mexican girlfriends was a Spanish-language exploitation flick similar in nature to the type of B-films Robert Rodriguez was imitating with El Mariachi but I always find it interesting to see how movie makers in other countries view the U.S. Of course, some do it more successfully than others; many British films about the Yanks seem as tedious as the American movies they’re trying to ridicule but still it’s an interesting experiment.
If nothing else, it makes for yet another variation on the philosophy best expressed by the old cliché: “We’re not the weird foreigners with funny eccentric ways; you are.”
And yes, American action movies really could use more musical numbers. After all, one used to see such numbers all the time in old film noir movies…
The absolute *earnestness* of this works about as well as a lead balloon.
LOL