Thunderbolts* puts Marvel back on track – thanks to Florence Pugh
THUNDERBOLTS*
★★★
PG, 126 minutes, in cinemas
This may be grading on a curve but I'm glad to report that with Thunderbolts*, directed by Jake Schreier, the Marvel Cinematic Universe has returned to a level of basic competence. The writing is as formulaic as ever, and the stale jokes even comment on their own staleness (when one character mentions Dr Phil, another points out that Dr Phil went off the air a while back). But it's better-paced than latter-day Marvel movies tend to be, with some effective action sequences and not too many pointless subplots.
I enjoyed it a good deal but almost entirely thanks to the actors, as always enormously better than the material deserves. First and foremost, that means Florence Pugh, returning as Yelena Belova, former Soviet super-soldier turned CIA assassin.
Basically comic relief in the 2021 Black Widow, Pugh is called on here to carry the film – and she finds a remarkable amount of nuance in a character who is basically a Cold War cartoon, as well as an adolescent fantasy of toughness and competence who beneath the surface still needs her daggy dad (David Harbour).
Julia Louis-Dreyfus, as Yelena's scheming boss Valentina Allegra de Fontaine, has also been part of the MCU for a while. But she, too, has received a promotion, stepping up to become the film's chief antagonist – and she turns out to be one of the more interesting Marvel villains: a hard-nosed pragmatist far too full of herself to notice as she gradually turns into a wicked witch.
Under investigation in the US, Valentina can only escape prison by eliminating all evidence of her past misdeeds, which means ordering the deaths of Yelena and others who have done her dirty work around the world. To save themselves in turn, her targets have to band together, an opportunity for the film to teach some lessons about co-operation similar to those once instilled in kids by Sesame Street.
A cliche of more recent vintage is the allegorical handling of trauma and depression, especially through the ambiguous figure of Bob (Lewis Pullman), a bewildered escapee from a top-secret laboratory who Yelena has to discourage from turning to the dark side.
Naturally, she also has demons of her own to grapple with, though, honestly, I'm a bit weary of troubled killers learning to accept their flaws and move on; I prefer those who kill without qualms, or else those who know they're going to hell, like John Wick.
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This uncanny ability allows Kostya to rise above his job as a humble dish pig and make a unique contribution to haute cuisine on the New York restaurant scene. Daria Lavelle's satire of the more pretentious side of that industry is deliciously spicy, although an insipid romantic arc does flatten its flavour for a time, even as the otherworldly consequences of Kostya's link with the world beyond add more than a hint of ghost story. It's an unusual mélange of genres, not always blended to perfection, but with an intriguing dark comic taste, nonetheless. Best Left Buried Neil A. White Echo, $32.99 The second in Neil A. White's Matt Latham series, Best Left Buried sets the reader onto a dark and desperate trail of international espionage. It's a thriller built upon the intrigues and misdeeds of the CIA in Latin America, and its anti-hero becomes entangled in a dangerous legacy when he agrees to ghostwrite the memoir of a friend, Bryant Callahan – previously a senior diplomat, soon to be a senator. Travelling to Dallas, his research uncovers unpalatable truths – Callahan's involvement with the CIA, and the troubling history (or lack of it) behind his wife Aleja, a former Miss Cuba orphaned as a child. When Aleja asks Matt to help find her birth family, a trip to Havana unearths scandalous secrets. Matt finds himself hunted by those determined to keep them from coming to light, as another figure implicated in the secret history travels from Mexico City to the US, hell-bent on revenge. The writing can sometimes be a bit too telegraphic for my taste, but it is a taut and rather well-paced thriller, dreamt up from the shadows of real historical events. Whisky Valley Joan Sauers Allen & Unwin, $32.99 In this sequel to Echo Lake, Joan Sauers returns to the Southern Highlands and her historian-cum-detective Rose McHugh. Understandably, Rose's narrow escape from becoming a murder victim in the last novel has left her on edge, but mysteries have a habit of seeking her out, and the latest begins when her son's best friend, a talented musician, disappears. Rose was never going to take the advice of friends and family and stay away from sleuthing, and as floodwaters surge, she finds herself unravelling threads of treachery – some of it close to home – as she takes on the missing person's case. Is this cosy crime? Not entirely. Sauers' heroine is likeable enough, there's a healthy dollop of romance, and the Highlands locale exudes rural charm and features a majestic natural setting. Still, the author does leave open the door to darkness in a way that builds suspense and should keep readers apprehensive about Rose's fate. Julie Chan Is Dead Liann Zhang Raven Books, $32.99 A struggling checkout chick swaps lives with her identical twin – an Insta-perfect influencer – in Julie Chan Is Dead, the debut novel from former 'skinfluencer' (skincare and beauty influencer) Liann Zhang. Discovering her estranged sister Chloe van Huusen dead in mysterious circumstances, Julie Chan wants to call 911 but can't resist stepping into her life of fame, fortune and followers and seizing it for her own. The twins were separated at a young age and their fates diverged, but Julie soon finds that Chloe did not live the enviable existence she imagined. The luxuries and labels come at a price – Julie must try to fit in with Chloe's beautiful influencer clique, the Belladonnas, and a week away with them reveals bizarre and disturbing behaviours that take on an increasingly sinister complexion. What really happened to Chloe? Will Julie be the next target? Zhang mixes mystery and horror and melodrama to capitalise on the market for stories about the toxicity of influencer culture. It's quite fun, but beyond the irresistible hook, I'm not sure that it does enough to make a lasting mark in a rapidly expanding subgenre. NON-FICTION PICK OF THE WEEK Ocean: Earth's Last Wilderness David Attenborough & Colin Butfield John Murray, $34.99 If you've seen David Attenborough's latest film Ocean, currently screening at cinemas, this book is an invitation to dive deeper. If you haven't seen it, you must. And then read this. While it spares us the film's graphic footage of the ruinous impact of industrial trawling, the dire implications for coastal communities and the health of the ocean in general are clear. The world's seas and their crucial role in sustaining life on Earth is a vast subject made intimate and accessible through the changes Attenborough has observed over the past century and the technological advances that have revolutionised our understanding of this watery realm. There are grim statistics – in his lifetime, almost half the world's coral has been lost – but there is also real reason for hope, as evidenced in the recovery of reefs, kelp forests and marine life in areas which have been declared sanctuaries. We know what needs to be done, say the authors, to fix the biggest problems we face as a species. 'The question is whether we also have the will and foresight to do so.' Monsterland Nicholas Jubber Scribe, $37.99 In the days when parts of the globe were still a mystery, cartographers marked uncharted regions with the phrase 'Here be monsters'. Since childhood, Nicholas Jubber has been drawn to the mythical creatures said to inhabit these margins. In this enchanting work, he travels to the shadowlands still haunted by such folk tales: to Cornwall searching for giants, Bavarian forests on the trail of dragons, Morocco in pursuit of supernatural beings known as genies or jinn, to Haiti where the story of the zombie took on chilling real life resonance as slaves, like 'living cadavers labour[ed] for their overlords'. Jubber focuses on four kinds of monster – the shapeshifter, the undead, the wild and creatures of the modern imagination – to explore the origins of these tales, what they tell us about the human psyche and how they live on in the present. With humour and flair, he probes how monsters register the 'emotional states of their epochs' and bind communities together. Michela Marzano Gazebo Books, $29.99 Michela Marzano had always thought of her grandfather as a refined, cultivated man. Then, in her 40s, she discovered that he'd also been a Fascist, a devotee of Benito Mussolini and member of his squadrista. 'Those thugs who beat up communists with their truncheons.' Marzano's parents were proudly left-wing, and her father never spoke of his father's politics. After her discovery, she is gripped by the thought that 'my grandfather must have been a monster'. What she learns about his experience as a soldier and a prisoner during the First World War helps her better understand his embrace of Fascism. As she delves into his personal archive, she also finds herself wrestling with the legacy of her father's domineering behaviour and its impact on her life. In this intense and unsettling memoir, Marzano constantly questions whether she should be exposing these family secrets, including her own mental health struggles. But the reader can only be grateful that she has braved her demons for the light they shed on how a nation's violent history reverberates down through the generations. Australia's Agricultural Identity Joshua Gilbert Penguin, $36.99 The marriage of Joshua Gilbert's convict forebear to a Worimi woman fused agriculture and culture, new and ancient ways, symbolising the aspirations of this forward-looking history-cum-memoir. From farming stock himself, Gilbert longs for the world to see that Indigenous people can thrive on the land, 'selling cattle at top prices, and golden fleece to make thousand-dollar suits'. And to recognise that their relationship with Country can evolve with new enterprises. Gilbert is a gifted yarn-spinner whose life story spans the divide between Indigenous and settler histories; a traditional rural upbringing with deeper roots. When he was a boy, his family didn't speak much of their Indigenous history. His adulthood has been a process of awakening to what it means to be an Indigenous person whose white ancestors worked for the Australian Agricultural Company that drove the Worimi people off their land. Through this personal lens, Gilbert offers a vision of what farming in Australia might become. Pilgrims have been making their way to sacred sites for millennia. These days, in the West, the destinations are more likely to be linked with the secular religion of sport. This guide to Australia's most celebrated venues is inevitably weighted in favour of team, rather than individual, sports with cricket grounds and AFL and rugby fields dominating, many of which are iconic and have international reputations. The absence of venues that host basketball, netball and soccer, however, might leave a few fans feeling miffed. Although numerous sites are products of the establishment – the MCG, SCG, Royal Melbourne Golf Club, Flemington Racecourse – the stories featured here are often the opposite. The SCG's renowned heckler known as Yabba is a prime example. At the more informal end of the spectrum are the surf breaks of Bells Beach and Snapper Rocks, and the Henley on Todd Regatta in Alice Springs, the famous waterless boat race. This is a bible for those seeking places of worship that align with their sporting values or that are of interest simply because of their legendary status.
