Peppermint Movie Review - Routine mayhem

A still from Peppermint trailer

Peppermint

U/A: Action, Drama, Thriller
Director: Pierre Morel
Cast: Jennifer Garner, John Gallagher Jr., John Ortiz
Ratings:

In this film Jennifer Garner repeats the stealth and action involved in her role as Sydney Bristow in the TV series 'Alias' while playing Riley North, a working mother who awakens from a coma after surviving a brutal attack that killed her husband Chris (Jeff Hephner) and 10-year-old daughter Carly (Cailey Fleming) in a drive-by shooting ordered by drug overlord Diego Garcia (Juan Pablo Raba). This exercise though is far more brutal and blood thirsty - leading up to a body count exercise that increments as the narrative reaches its climax.

The actress who has a physicality that is suited to such badass characters makes the desired effect but there's little here to tease the brain-dead or draw in the connoisseur. The narrative is very much an in-your-face action extravaganza designed to personify the female form as a justified vigilante seeking vengeance. She may not be as buffed and muscular as a Stallone or Schwarzenegger but she has the strength and the charisma to make her role look doable.

Watch the trailer here:

The narrative transcends the five-year gap between the main event and the vengeance spiel with mere tokenism. An FBI file picture shows North in the Asian underground fighting in freestyle repose. We are expected to assume that in the interim the lady underwent a transformation in body and mind that literally turns her into a killing machine of 'Terminator' caliber. She also develops the stealth to elude the underworld, the police, and the FBI, right to the very 'bloody' end. Farfetched and unbelievable though it seems, the torment of the main character does manage to tug at your heart-strings for a bit. But there's not enough meat there to buy into the unbelievable endgame played out here. The characters lack depth and the aesthetic choices are rudimentary. The finale, involving Riley, the criminals and the cops at Skid Row, is rather unreal. The edit is such that each character remains out of the frame unless it's necessary for North to finish off the other. This film is neither particularly entertaining nor interesting. It is at best a conscious attempt to even out the gender divide in mainstream Hollywood.

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