Charlie's Angels DVD > Reviews > A Very Nice Set Of Charlie's

Author's product rating:   

Did you enjoy it?	Loved it
Story	Very ordinary
Characters / Performances	Good
Special Effects	Good
Soundtrack	Outstanding

Advantages:	Superb, brain - in - netral campy fun with non - stop flashy action sequences
Disadvantages:	Very 'music video' in style, Tom Green sucks, not for the curmudgeonly .  .  . and don't expect to expand your mind here !

Recommend to potential buyers:

yes

Full review

Sometimes you see a movie released and form a negative impression of it based upon the performance of its peers rather than upon any real evidence about the movie itself to support your distrust. Despite getting some rather decent reviews at the time, Charlie's Angels was a movie I personally had vowed to avoid as being just another lame Hollywood attempt to cash in on the successes of retro TV shows. Having already suffered the atrocious mess they made of The Avengers that year as well as having sat through the likes of The Partridge Family, The Beverly Hillbillies, Mission Impossible, Wild, Wild West(yes, that was based on a 60s TV show no one remembers) and countless other dire pieces of TV tie-in tripe I wasn't about to even consider shelling out for more of the same!

I'm pleased to say I was wrong though because this is one of the exceptions which prove that, handled well, TV tie-is can be enormous fun and guarantee top entertainment! The Fugitive is the only other real success which springs to mind, although I did enjoy Maverick and a couple of the others were relatively entertaining. What makes this fun is a combination of factors, but not least, it has absolutely no qualms at poking fun at itself, has a fantastic cast who throw themselves into their roles with enormous quirky enthusiasm, is packed with action and has a relentlessly upbeat urge to thrill and entertain. It also has the best collection of tracks on the soundtrack that I've heard for a long time...

Charlie's Angels is, as I hinted at and I'm sure you already know anyway, based upon the popular 70s TV show of the same name which was arguably the very first example of mainstream girl power to assault the public eye. Hitting the screens in 1976(although it was during the 80's that I saw it), it ran for 5 seasons, changing cast several times but most well remembered for its original three angels of Farrah Fawcett, Jaclyn Smith and Kate Jackson who were a crime fighting team sent on missions by the disembodied voice of 'Charlie' who we never ever got to actually see, but who was the girls' mentor and boss. Apparently, there were to be cameos from these three in the movie but Fawcett demanded a larger role than the other two(ahhh sweet vanity...) and the whole thing fell through. Instead, we have three new angels played by Cameron Diaz, Lucy Liu and Drew Barrymore...which plays nicely upon the eye candy appeal of the original anyway for us guys... ;o)

Returning from the original show however is John Forsythe who reprises the vocal role of the elusive Charlie so there's at least one cameo appearance for the fans. Also along for the ride comes the superb Bill Murray and bad guys Tim Curry and his surprisingly sinister henchman Crispin Glover...I said it had a great cast! Anyhoo, the storyline follows the same format as one of the shows, blasting straight into the action and having Charlie introduce his sassy, butt-kicking angels in supremely camp 70s style as they pull off a ludicrous stunt with winning smiles and jiggly cleavage. The tone of the movie is set immediately, tongue-in-cheek, camp and rampantly unashamed of it! And impossible not to be carried along with the fun...

We are soon introduced to Bosley(Bill Murray), the owner of the detective agency through which Charlie speaks to his girls. They have a case, the owner of some kind of techie company has been kidnapped by his rival Roger Corwin(played by Tim Curry) and the girls must step in to save him, battling against all kinds of twists and baddies including the brilliant Crispin Glover as the silent but deadly 'Thin Man', probably the best on-screen villain I've seen this year! Umm, in all reality the plot is rather inconsequential and possible even a little over-egged because no one is going to be interested in the kinds of twists it does offer, but it does serve as an excellent framework for a surprisingly entertaining movie.

The buzz word here is fun - highly charged, kinetic fun. Charlie's Angels literally explodes onto your screen in top gear and never once even looks at though it might feel like changing down. It is a cacophony of Matrix style fight sequences, plunging necklines and music video stylistics and you can't help but be swept along with the flow. The movie is as keen to poke fun at its source material as it is to pay homage to it and this tongue-in-cheek irreverence doesn't outstay its welcome as it usually tends to elsewhere...probably because there isn't much time to draw breath and dwell on anything!

Diaz throws herself into the role of ditzy blonde with enormous enthusiasm and is simply radiant throughout, Drew Barrymore too is equally superb and both are perfect for their respective roles. Lucy Liu is an actress who I don't think has really proven herself on the big screen yet although this is undoubtedly her best performance...but she lacks much of the charisma needed to pull it off and really suffers in the shade of two of Hollywood's most charismatic. Having Charlie voiced by the original actor is a nice touch and Bill Murray is easily one of the most dependable comedy actors around and although in a small supporting role, is as excellent as ever. Perhaps the only real weak link are the bad guys in the movie because Tim Curry is a little on the lame side as a baddie to be honest. I like Curry, but somehow he doesn't seem to offer anything convincing for this role. On the other hand, Crispin Glover, makes up for this all by himself without uttering a single word throughout. Oh yeah and Tom Green has possibly the most annoying cameo role ever as boat owner Chad...or "the Chad" as he keeps calling himself...umm, yeah, less said the better!

I'd usually tell you a movie like this is good, clean, dumbassed fun but that would be to do Charlie's Angels a disservice because I think it is cleverer than that. First time director 'McG' (Joseph McGinty Mitchell) manages to make even the flicking of Diaz' hair a laugh out loud moment and the way in which nods and winks to the 70s are literally everywhere without looking shoe-horned in is quite brilliant at times. No it's not a work of genius but it is as near perfect as a movie about Charlie's Angels could ever have been! The whole thing is topped off by some great music video style flashy camerawork and an absolutely fantastic soundtrack featuring the likes of "Baby Got Back"(one of my all time dumbass faves), "Turning Japanese", "Groove Is In The Heart" and other great 'oldies' and a couple of newer tracks from Aerosmith, Fatboy Slim and Destiny's Child.

Overall, I think you’ve probably guessed I'm a fan. Charlie's Angels doesn't set out to do anything but be entertaining and it achieves its aims superbly. Despite its girl power undertones it doesn't once attempt to deliver any kind of message and will probably appeal more because of it. If you want to see it as women kicking ass in the ultimate feminist, female empowerment action movie then please do, others will see misogynist, exploitative overtones in the gratuitous(about as gratuitous as a PG gets anyway :oP) amount of plunging neckline and a naked roll down an embankment by Barrymore and Lucy Liu's PVC clad dominatrix scene, either are there if you want to look hard enough for the themes. The rest of us will be entertained by one of the best TV tie-ins ever, which is how it should be.

Don't think, don't analyse, just watch and enjoy.