Barely Lethal puts a spin on the high school movie by making its lead character a trained assassin. This is an intriguing premise, but the end result isn’t as interesting as it sounds. The film doesn’t really do much to integrate the fact that the main character is a trained killer, and instead just makes it an excuse for her general awkwardness around other teenagers. The film, as it turns out, mainly wants to emulate the success of the movies that its main character uses for research, turning its premise into little more than an obligation.
The film begins by introducing Prescott, and a secret academy that trains little girls to become assassins. One of the girls there, 83 (Hailee Steinfeld), comes to resent having her childhood taken away. When the opportunity presents itself, she fakes her death and runs away. She yearns to have a normal high school experience, or at least the kind of experience she sees in movies. She poses as Megan, a foreign exchange student from Canada. She soon finds that high school isn't what she thought it was. And worse yet, she isn't able to hide from Prescott for very long.
The film splits its attention between many various concerns. There is the awkwardness generated from the dichotomy between Megan's "research" and the reality of fitting in. There is a love triangle where she is meant to choose between two guys. There is some time devoted to her relationship with the family that took her in. And then there's the actual plot, which involves an arms dealer that has it out for Prescott. It's a lot to juggle, and the film doesn't do it very well. Nothing really gets the attention needed to make the narrative work.
The love triangle, for example, stays on the very surface of teenage interaction. The film doesn't really invest in the chemistry between characters, and in the end Megan's choice ends up feeling G really arbitrary. The threat of the villain is hardly ever felt. She seems to exist solely to provide the film some sort of action filled climax. Every arc feels truncated, the film just hitting all the appropriate buttons without really investing anything into all the choices.
As an action film, it all feels pretty subpar. The budget is small, but the filmmaking doesn't adjust to fit the scale. And so it all looks really chintzy, the film attempting blockbuster moves with a fraction of the resources. It could have spent more time just trying to make the fights feel real. Hailee Steinfeld is charming, but she doesn't quite have the tools to make the role work. The best bits of this film are in the periphery, where comedy veterans liven up a handful of supporting roles. Samuel L. Jackson and Jessica Alba get to ham it up a bit, and that’s mostly fun. But it’s Rob Huebel and Rachel Harris who steal the show, getting a lot out of really small, one-note roles.
Barely Lethal ends up backing too far away from the core elements of its premise. At one point, Megan admits that she hasn’t really ever killed anyone. This comes after an hour of the movie constantly reiterating how Prescott trains its agents to be ruthless. There are occasional bits of cleverness in this movie, but for the most part it seems content to color within the lines. It strips away whatever is unique about the premise and instead just repeats the story beats of better movies. The movie just isn’t nearly as fun as it could have been.
My Rating:
