By Michael Hernandez
Entertainment Reporter
Birds of Prey is a quirky action film with plenty of laughs and plenty of action. The movie starts with a narrative from Harley Quinn, who’s played by Margot Robbie, where she describes her version of her break-up with The Joker. Now that she no longer has Joker’s protection, she’s wanted by every criminal-type in Gotham City and a lot of cops, mainly Detective Montoya (Rosie Perez).
The first half of the movie belongs to Robbie as she dances through whatever comes her way and shows her deranged and demented point-of-view. Her half of the movie is a lot of fun. Then, the plot gets rolling when the evil Roman Sionis, AKA Black Mask (Ewan McGregor), puts out a bounty on a little girl named Cass, (13-year-old Ella Jay Basco) and that’s when the movie kicks into overdrive. The little girl has swallowed a priceless diamond and there is nothing that Black Mask and his henchmen won’t do to retrieve it.
A singer at Roman Sionis’ club has an ear-piercing vocal range and some serious street-fighting skills. She is known as Black Canary (Jurnee Smollett-Bell). The rest of the kick-butt girl crew consists of Mary Elizabeth Winstead as Huntress, who’s hell-bent on revenge after her entire family is killed in front of her and Rosie Perez’s Detective Montoya, who gets kicked of the police force.
All of the ladies are really good in their roles, but it’s the badder than before Margo Robbie’s Harley Quinn, who has the blackest soul with a heart of gold. She doesn’t believe in anything and has the morals of a jackal, which by the way, Harley has one as a pet. In the end, she just wants to be liked.
Birds of Prey is rated R and runs 1 hour and 49 minutes. The movie is a guilty pleasure. It will have you laughing at things that you really know you shouldn’t, but you won’t be able to help yourself.
On my “Hollywood Popcorn Scale,” I rate Birds of Prey a JUMBO.
