Charlie’s Angels (2000)

Directed by: McG | 98 minutes | action, comedy | Actors: Cameron Diaz, Drew Barrymore, Lucy Liu, Bill Murray, Sam Rockwell, Kelly Lynch, Tim Curry, Crispin Glover, Matt LeBlanc, Tom Green

Sometimes you can tell from a mile away what a movie is going to be and ‘Charlie’s Angels’ is a perfect example. You expect a movie episode of a hit series from the seventies with three ‘sassy lassies’, directed as one long video clip within a safe action/comedy formula and you get it. Done, you might say, but in this case the ingredients are processed with such ease that the film deserves an extra mention.

Who would have guessed that the three ‘Angels’ of the new millennium would fit together so well and radiate so much fun? It seems real. You’ve got Cameron Diaz — long overdue for the new Goldie Hawn and the only woman whose smile is wider than her hips — and Drew Barrymore — the teddy bear of Hollywood — and Lucy Liu — spunky secret from Ally McBeal — and it works like a train. Diaz gets to parody her role in ‘There’s Something About Mary’, Barrymore her wrung-out private life (absent father; soft boyfriends including Tom Green) and Liu? She is the ‘asian’ in the marketing picture and can show her friends some martial arts.

‘Opposites attract’ to the three little angels, that is clear, but it was not obvious that these actresses would also look slick in an action comedy. Give director McG (in his portfolio – yes – mountains of video clips) the credit. The action scenes are spectacular; duckling Drew is even given an impressive cleavage and the tempo changes that you normally have between action and dialogue are hardly noticeable. Criticism is that this makes the film seem like a succession of style moments, a linked playlist from MTV, but it is done with so much panache, professionalism and above all irony, that it is manageable – it is entertainment after all. We should especially look for humor in the direction of the love life of the ladies and the right tone is also found here. An experienced comedian like Bill Murray hardly stands out in the women’s violence as Bosley’s assistant.

An hour and a half of entertainment: you ask for it and you get it with ‘Charlie’s Angels’ and there are a lot of movies that don’t even make it. And the story? Ah, the story…