
Genres: ActionThrillerAdvent
Starring: Jordi Mollà , Michael Vartan, Jesse Borrego, Zoe Saldana, Cliff Curtis, Graham McTavish, Lennie James
Director(s): Olivier Megaton
Available Quality: Hi Def
Country: USA, France
Year: 2011
Available Quality: DivX, Hi Def, Hi Def
IMDB Rating: 6.2 out of 10 (22480 votes)
A young woman grows up to be a stone-cold assassin after witnessing her parents murder as a child in Bogota. She works for her uncle as a hitman by day, but her personal time is spent engaging in vigilante murders that she hopes will lead her to her ultimate target - the mobster responsible for her parents death.
FivePointReviews (25 May 2012)
First of all this is NOT a movie about Colombia. The producers may havefailed on representing it but this is not the POINT of this movie. It'san action movie about a girl from Colombia and that's pretty much itregarding Colombia. Don't get all frustrated with it. Here's my quickreview: 1 - Trailer: I wanted to see this movie mostly based on the trailerwhich I found catchy. Action and sexy Zoe Saldana sells it all. Still Iwent on a cheap night because I wasn't convinced this would be worththe full price entry. What you see in the trailer is what you get. Alot of action left to be seen and overall it's a good intro to themovie.2 - Cast & Characters: Ahhh Zoe Zoe! It's hard to watch her rather thanjust stare at her. She delivers a pretty solid performance in thismovie. She goes all around sneaking up the bad guys and taking them outin creative and yet plausible ways unlike Angelina Jolie in Salt (2010)where her 100 pounds character takes out multiple 250 pounds guys infist fights. The supporting characters are your "typical" Mexican(Colombian in this story!) guys that pretty much do nothing other thanholding guns outside a villa and sipping on drink and cigars. Genericpolice guys fill the rest of the cast but I found Callum Blue quiteenjoyable to watch.3 - Plot & Story: I think the story is so generic that the littletwists added to the script makes them even more surprising. You alwaysfeel like you know the next move but most of the time somethingunexpected happens. Unfortunately, the script as a whole is a bitsloppy and poorly paced. I didn't get bored at all in this movie andthough the intrigue isn't much catchy, it was enough to keep meinterested. There are many laughable moments (mostly intended) which isfun but the drama is really cheesy.4 - Theme & Genre: As an action flick, this one stands right. It isn'ta melting pot of car crashes and explosions out of nowhere. There isplenty of action and a good mix between Hollywood fireworks andrealistic fights. The camera angles and editing sometimes get confusingbut in some scenes they really add something cool to watch.5 - Overall Appreciation: Alright let's face the obvious. There is noOscars material here. This will get MTV Teen Choice Awards at best.It's a cheap night movie that is entertaining to watch and where youshould not expect a classic in cinema. Did I appreciate it? Yes! Is itgood? Not bad. I give it 6 out of 10 for Zoe Saldana, good fight scenesand cinematography. Too bad the supporting characters, cheesy drama andpoor script kills it a bit.
astronomydomine-158-169339 (24 May 2012)
My wife and I went to see the movie about 1 week ago with guardedexpectations. She is from Colombia and I have spent many happy timesthere visiting my extended family and enjoying the beauty of my adoptedcountry where will most likely retire some day. It is a beautiful andvibrant country and culture. Nothing like what was shown in the openingscenes of the movie which were all shot in Mexico. Bogata looks nothinglike what the movie portrayed and the actors were all from somewhereother than the country they were supposed to represent. Although Ican't speak for the movie as a whole because my wife and I got up andleft in disgust after only 15 minutes, I can tell you that if you aregoing to show another country's culture and scenery, you should do alittle research first and actually film on location. To us Americans,it would have been like filming a movie about a person growing up inNew York with the filming done in Toronto. I think those of us who loveour country would have done the same, walk out and ask for our moneyback.
Jaho Koo (24 May 2012)
My expectations towards movies tend to go down when it comes to certaingenres. Girls with guns is one of these typ of movies. I don't expectgreat characters and I certainly don't expect masterpiece writing. Idon't really care about originality when it comes to these films so Idon't judge a movie by that. But what I do want is a build up ofconflict and that can be achieved through the basic formula of theFreytag's Pyramid. Colombiana fails in the basics of writing.First I'm going to address the writing which is terrible in manyaspects. These are the three things that suffer the most: the story,the dialogue and the characters.The story starts with a gratuitously long exposition. It sets up thestage for a revenge action movie but it just drags on and on and on. Tomake a long story short a little girl's parents are betrayed by a gangboss and killed. The girl goes to Chicago where she asks her uncle totrain her to become a killer. This movie could have gone to the editingroom a few more times. Now when we finally see the adult version of our protagonist, thingsactually improve. The jail scene is how I like to call it and it's thebest scene in the whole movie. It introduces our protagonist as anintelligent and stealthy badass and convinces the audience that she cando what she's meant to do: kill people. This was entertaining.Then we're introduced to Zoe Saldana's boyfriend whose name I'veforgotten (we'll get to the crappy characters later) and they have alittle romantic moment. I don't know how this subplot contributes tothe main story...but then we go back to Zoe Saldana killing anothertarget. Wait a second, didn't I already see this in a video game? Yeah,I think this is the exact same scene from Hit-man! The fat old man inrobes lying down in bed with two prostitutes with guards laying about.Zoe points a gun on her target and says, "it doesn't matter who I am."Wait, what? I think this is the perfect example of how stupid thedialogue is in this film. This is a retarded line; of course it'sIMPORTANT who she is. Imagine if Inigo Montoya killed Count Rugenwithout identifying himself. The most important thing about revenge isthat you're getting back at someone and letting them know that they'vemade a mistake by screwing you up. But hey that line sounded prettycool in the trailer right? Zoe Saldana says, "I'm not going to killyou," and shoots the glass floor and then her target falls into theshark pool. This is worse than Batman leaving someone on a fallingtrain and saying that he didn't kill him.So naturally Zoe goes back to...her boyfriend. They have sex and we getto see some nudity and now I see the reason behind this boyfriendcharacter's existence. The audience needs to get their share ofnudity...that's the only explanation. Obviously Zoe's character is akiller and she's very private to herself, even to her boyfriend. Shedoesn't tell him where she's from or what her job is. Let me ask aperfectly sensible question, then why have a boyfriend?Then Zoe goes to kill another target. Then she comes back for more sex.Then she goes to kill another target. Then she comes back for sex. Doyou see what I mean by saying this movie's a loop? It's just killingand sex over and over again. This isn't building conflict. My God arethe cops stupid in this film. They wait for Zoe to kill 23 peoplebefore starting to do something about it. All the while Zoe's Uncle istelling her she's going to draw attention to the family. Zoe's prettycool with that until in one scene she just drops to her knees andcries, "I didn't know!" You didn't know? What about the fact thatyou've been told multiple times that this would happen?In the climax Zoe goes for her last kill. This isn't entertaining orclimactic in any sense. This is proof that this movie just went inloops instead of building a story. The whole movie's just a flat line.The characters are either stupid or unnecessary and the dialogue theyshare are either stupid or unnecessary. This film is stupid andunnecessary; avoid it!
(23 May 2012)
Cataleya (Saldana) sees her parents killed and she vows at age 10 tobecome an assassin to avenge those deaths.Okay, now we have Cat (Stenberg) a 10-yr old action hero who grows upto be the assassin she always wanted to be. How good is that? I'm stillfiguring out what I want to be when I grow up. Is she as good as MattDamon in those Bourne movies? You bet. Cataleya as Cat at age 10 has some moves to die for as she runs fromthe people who killed her parents. As an adult those moves are still apart of her and she is a no-nonsense assassin. Sometimes that is whatis needed especially when she goes after the bad guys. This moves at a good pace and you won't be bored. It's a typical actionmovie with all the trappings except that the action hero is Cataleya.The FBI and the CIA are at odds as to who is committing all these hitsand believe they are looking for a man. HA ! Keep in mind that all of her hits are meant to send a message to thepeople who killed her parents. There is method to her madness. All inall very well done. The action scenes whether actual stunts or CGI wereright on the mark. (7/10)Violence: Yes. Sex: No. Nudity: No. Language: Yes.
Robert Collins (22 May 2012)
Colombiana is just a mindless action romp with no substance and far toomany action scenes and no characterization , it really isn't a greatfilm, the only thing that is great in any way about it is the ratherstring performance from Zoe Saldana, she will easily become a greataction star after this, I do think it's good that females are startingto become more prominent in the action genre, this however was just toocliché ridden ti compete with great films of late such as Salt orHanna.So many times throughout this film I was thinking cliché clichécliché!!! If you switch your mind off and decide you don't want to knowanything about your characters you will be fine to enjoy Colombiana.Parts of Colombiana are OK, a strong opening sequence with the youngerCataleya is very good and the first scene where the adult Cataleya goesall mission impossible in a prison is also great to watch,unfortunately from there it all just goes down hill, the whole romanceaspect towards the end of the movie isn't convincing in the slightestand it's really unnecessary in a film like this.It's just not up to scratch in my opinion, just a b-grade femaleassassin that isn't memorable in the slightest. I hope that Zoe Saldanagets another chance at a great action film because she is really theonly good thing Colombiana has to offer and I think in a better roleshe could really shine.Mindless, Cliché, Unimpressive.
paulvcassidy (22 May 2012)
I've trebled my consumption of Colombian coffee since watching thisfilm. I buy my GranArom in Lidl for half the price of the competitors.It's kind of addictive. In any event Zoe Saldana has the features of achick coffee bean. She's cut, delicious, hypercool and best of allcolored like treacle and designed for speed. She'll be back that's forsure. The film stands in the beautiful tradition of well shot LatinAmerican action thrillers so rich in colour and atmosphere that theytranscend the obvious struggle of the human condition. Latin America isthe one poor place where I feel I could manage being poor. The luxuryof the place seems to envelope the poverty like some kind of celestialcape. Perhaps Our Lady of Guadelupe stands with these people in amysterious sense that radiates onto the places and the faces of it'speople. That aside the profound longing for social justice beneath thewretched competition to get out and be successful by any means. Thelads cut ice too, their accented Colombian English seems to rob thelanguage of the notion of proper pronunciation its value and meaninghappily lost in trans-enunciation. They almost seem to chew on theirwords savoring there character and form transforming a sentence intosomething else in the process highlighting that the effect of what iscommunicated is generally more important than its content. As good abunch of bad guys as you're likely to meet. But as for how theColombian coffee industry missed the opportunity for product placementI do not know. A very entertaining excellently shot movie driven by theremorseless kill-stinct of Catalinaaah. Oh to kill with impunity andgrace bringing beauty to the deed. And that my friends is whatBitch-Killer movies are all about; the notion that violent death can bewrapped up in the aesthetic. The Angel of Death is most definitely afeminine spirit.
Frederick Smith (21 May 2012)
Zoe Saldana as a hit woman, a professional killer. As improbable asthat may seem, she pulls it off, showing us a very different side ofher abilities than we have seen in previous films. Perhaps it is thedirecting abilities of Olivier Megaton, or the writing of Luc Beeson,but there is a fluidity in this film that leads the audience into therealm of probability. The casting is exceptional, and the supportingroles for her character give an air of excitement and credibility to anotherwise mundane story of revenge. Of particular note is the lack ofsex-ploitation so often associated with these types of films. While thesex is implied, there are no explicit scenes, and no frontal nuditytossed in as titillation, which is refreshing in itself. The actionscenes are interspersed with enough exposition to keep the plotinteresting, and Cataleya's character is nicely developed throughoutthe story. Rated PG-13 in the theaters, there is an unrated version inthe video stores which contains more blood and gore. Violence,language, "disturbing scenes", and sexuality are the caveats here, sothe little ones should probably be tucked in before the teens andparents put this one in the player. While I don't see this one asparticularly collectible, it isn't a waste of your time if you'relooking to be entertained.
jerrilynnbthomas (20 May 2012)
I wasn't really interested in going to see Columbiana. My daughterwanted to see it before she went off to college. I am so glad she mademe take her.Young Catelaya blew me away! Her parents taught her well. She played itcool. That little girl is going to be a big star someday.I skeptical about how a woman that thin could kick butt. Zoe was simplyfantastic. She needed to be thin so she could fit through all of thosetight spaces. Brute strength wasn't needed. She had to be smart to planher entry and escape and know how to defend herself.The action was phenomenal from beginning to end. It's worth seeingagain.
davideo-2 (20 May 2012)
STAR RATING: ***** Saturday Night **** Friday Night *** Friday Morning** Sunday Night * Monday Morning As a young girl, Cateleya (Zoe Saldana) witnessed her parent's murderat the hands of drug cartels in her native Columbia, and was taken inby her uncle Cliff (Emilio Restrepo) to whom she confesses her desireto be a killer. Years later, she's achieved this aim, remaining withher one true intention to find her parent's killers. But closing in onher trail is Agent Ross (Lennie James) with whom she engages in adeadly confrontation.Colombia's reputation as one of the most violent, lawless places onearth provides an impressively suitable back drop for a high octaneaction film, and you wonder why it hasn't been used in many othersbefore it. The trouble with Colombiana is, this morally chaotic, vacuum of a worldis absorbed seemingly into the story, which lacks any sort of humanlydecent centre, with a young girl aided and abetted into a world ofkilling for money by adults who should know better and who grows up tobe a 'heroine' who threatens the lives of the children of lawenforcement agents and fails to get any sort of comeuppance.The action sequences are decently done and entertaining enough, butthey are so ridiculous and unbelievable that they infuriate rather thanentertain. Olivier Megaton's film is just one big, long style oversubstance, morally vacuous non-entity, that does about as much for themind and soul as it does for the Colombia tourist board. **
FatMan-QaTFM (19 May 2012)
Oh lordy, this movie has got all the elements I love: Luc Besson co-writing (Fifth Element, Transporter, Leon), Zoe Saldana in skin-tightoutfights, tons of action (see: Luc Besson), and - no joke - the movieis directed by Olivier MEGATON. Okay, so that's his entertainer name,but still, with a name like Megaton his movies had better be actionpacked.We definitely got action. Unexpectedly, the cute, shy Amandla Stenberg- playing young Cataleya - showed off some nice action moves. A parkourchase ensues in the chaotic ghettos of the Colombian city, ending upwith young Cataleya winning access to the US. Years later, she hasbecome a smart, sexy, and extremely dangerous killer. Although thereare some little plot twists and character growth in the film (discussednext), go for the action. It's got a nice mix of tricky MissionImpossible missions mixed with fancy gun play and a nice hand- to-handcombat scene. Throughout all of this, viewers are treated to afascinating PG-13 ballet danced by the camera to show every inch ofSaldana's body while avoiding the naughty R-rated bits.Action movies with plot? Never! Colombiana takes a few stabs atbuilding complexity in to Cataleya's motives and actions without a lotof success. She has the strained boss/uncle relationship, a massivegrudge against the man who killed her father, and an awkwardlywedged-in sex-only relationship with a hack artist. None of these,especially the artist relationship, do much more than try to cramlittle bits of sympathy into an otherwise cold character. "What do youfeel?" "Sometimes I get lonely." I see what you did there - I feellonely sometimes too! It's an action movie. Her parents were murdered -what more do we need to know? At the end of the film, Cataleya's nodifferent, no better than she was before - she's just left a wake ofdestruction and misery in her path.Am I being over analytical by picking apart the main character?Probably, but why try to craft a character with any depth if you'regoing to have her return to the shallow end of the pool when it'sconvenient to pick the action back up? Transporter 1 through 3 werecompletely devoid of any attempts at meaningful story, but who cares!They're crazy-fun action movies. Cataleya also has the Captain Americaproblem of being a little too perfect. It's just hard to build tensionwhen your hero cannot fail.The verdict: fun action movie with distracting blah blah blah. Also, nonipples.
beaucheri33 (18 May 2012)
The only thing that disappointed me about this film is that it had allthe right ingredients but didn't deliver... I actually thought thatwith a cast with cliff curtis, jordi molla, and of course the fabulousZoe Saldana that you couldn't go wrong, but unfortunately this wasnothing more than a good attempt to glorify "Girl Power" with a weakstoryline. was it a horrible movie??? of course not!! I've definitelyseen worst, and it was definitely watchable, but just not the gem thati thought it would be. "Columbiana" is the type of film that you reallyshouldn't take seriously because you already know what's coming.. whatyou see in the previews is what you get.. there's no unexpected twistsor turns, and some things within the film are very unrealistic, butstill fun to watch...my advice : Don't believe the hype or the hatersbecause it's not great nor horrible... take this film for what it is...a cool and sexy action flick.
chris dimarino (18 May 2012)
There are so many movies with a identical framework to this movie, somegood, many awful. To succeed, you must present unique and enviableprotagonists, wow with interesting action and stealth clips and providea partially compelling story. This movie lacks in every case. I wasexcited to see Zoe Saldana in this role and found her very mediocre.But when I noticed the rest of the cast, i was worried that this moviewas going to rely on her too much. This was unfortunately the casewhich is sad, because I believe if one or two more good names were inthis movie, they might have accented her role and provided some form ofchemistry. The result however was a very generic, rough around theedges hard to relate to movie. The few bright spots, were someinteresting action and stealth sequences which bordered onimpossibility and embellishment. Overall, I would not recommend thismovie to anyone, unless they had absolutely nothing better to do.
ncjrealtor (17 May 2012)
I wasn't expecting much from the story besides action, which there wasplenty of. Zoe was quick with the moves and besides needing to suspendbelief that she could out power every man she fought I liked the actionscenes. However, the acting was less then stellar from Zoe showing thatshe can not handle putting a entire movie on her back. On a moreshallow note, I though Zoe was Way hotter and great eye candy but,shelooked way to skinny and she is just not as hot as I thought she was.Over all a disappointing movie. On another note, I really do notunderstand why I need ten lines of text to submit a movie review. Mostforms of communication like Twitter give only a small amount of textavailable. This helps keep your views to a laser point. Making me typeten lines of text when I can make my point in five just makes thereader board even quicker and less likely to read my or any otherreview again. Well, I think that's enough lines now.
Dr. Michael J. McColley-Parmer (17 May 2012)
And cold and cool is this crime action drama in which Zoe Saldana(Cateleya) relentlessly pursues the narco-trafficking thugs who killedher parents. Amid the explosive violence, the suspenseful chase scenesand a bittersweet love affair, Cateleya forces us to reconsider theprimal loyalties of family and trust. Notable performances are given byAmandla Stenberg, a delightful child actor who portrays a verydetermined, single minded 10 year old Cateleya, who shows us thegenesis of the huntress Cateleya becomes. The movie, however, is Zoe'sas Ms Saldana epitomizes the hip, fast, cunning gunsel who alwayscaptures her prey, but loses everything she loves and cherishes in theprocess.
kevin-miller447 (16 May 2012)
This film plays out like if the Jason Bourne trilogy married any of thethree Hit-man games. That is pretty much one sentence that perfectlydescribes this movie. The cast is fine, not impressive and the actionis fun but poorly shot and brutally edited to the point that you areconfused as to what is going on and you feel very disoriented after awhile wondering why they don't slow down and show you each shot insteadof cutting every second. A lot of the scenes didn't make sense, therewere numerous plot holes that were never explained and things ingeneral that just didn't add up. Script was weak and this movie has oneof the most awkward sexual scenes I've seen in a movie. dissatisfyingand not worth seeing unless your desperate to see Zoe naked from behindand dressed in skimpy outfits.
Kelly B (16 May 2012)
We went to see this movie in the theater last week. After reading thereviews of some critics I didn't expect too much about this one. And tobe honest, if you leave the theater after the first pursuit (about 15minutes in the movie) you'd say the critics were totally right. Thedirecting of the action sequence was that terrible but after that itimproved a lot and the movie exceeded my expectations by far. Althoughthe story is very shallow, the character depth is detailed enough toimpersonate with the main characters. Although it's not the kind ofmovie that will stick for a long time but if you love vigilance movieswith a happy Hollywood end I can really recommend this movie.
shannon_ranaweera (15 May 2012)
The movie plot is the quite predictable revenge story which audienceshave seen a thousand times. It also has a tinge of tomb raider-ness init, but not quite.At the start of the movie the girl playing the young Cataleya managesto prepare the audience for the future killer role played by Zoe.Zoe zaldana, delivers a great performance in acting, stunts and action.But the support she gets from other characters are quite saddening.Also the most of the action scenes seems to be fast forwarded trying toimprove the close combats. However, Her screen presence and actingmanages to add a bit of taste to the poor script which I personallythink should have included at least a twist towards the end.Overall, its an enjoyable movie with not much of thinking needed. Ifzoe was not cast in this, it would have been an utter flop.
colinbarnard-1 (15 May 2012)
I'm glad some of the other reviewers on this site have acknowledgedthat Columbiana is a French film. Having the dialogue in English,pandering to the English speaking market does not detract from thefreshness of what is on the screen. Rather than a Hollywoodpaint-by-numbers exercise in boredom, we are given a wonderfullyempathetic lead character played by Zoe Saldana with completebelievability. Olivier Megaton directs the Luc Besson script with aneye to original twists to clichéd action sequences. I went in expectingless than what I got, and came out wanting to buy the DVD when it isreleased, hoping for a sequel. Far better than most American madesummer fare. Congrats to all.
ebl1112 (15 May 2012)
This movie has non-stop action. Zoe was wonderful in this movie. It wasgreat to see a female assassin in action! I think that the movie couldhave been fleshed out a little more to show how she trained to becomean assassin. She was very smart and agile in mind and body. If shecould have gotten her emotions under control, she would have been abetter assassin.Her family story could have had more detail as well. The writer/editorcould have done a little better with the background people. Her fatherand mother could have had more substance as well as her uncle.The main character seemed to be able to plan all of her hits down tothe last detail.
bcnewell88 (14 May 2012)
**Spoiler alert** (If you could call it that).I didn't expect this movie to be a very artistic and moving film atall, I expected it to be an action movie, possibly along the lines ofLeon or Taken. Sadly it was even a terrible action movie.The plot wasn't terrible, but only because there was almost no plot tobegin with. I would normally say spoiler alert, except I can't becausethe plot is already spoiled. The main character is a girl who's parentsget murdered and she goes to America and becomes an assassin. Weessentially have no understanding on why her parents were killed otherthan her parents were in a shady business with the antagonist, and ithas something to deal with information on disks that is somehowrelevant to the U.S. government or something. These points are about 30seconds of the movie in total. She obviously attempts to exact herrevenge a few years later yet the antagonist has protection from theCIA for some reason unexplained. She assassinates people and eventuallyis able to threaten enough people to find her parents killer. Meanwhileher love interest knows absolutely nothing about her, (she literallyjust appears at his apartment and they have never gone out on a date)and he's apparently in love with her. At least something like Taken hasa little plot; Liam Neeson's daughter is taken for slave trade and hemust go around chasing clues of corruption.Aside from the plot, or lack thereof this movie was still bad. We areleft so many times tilting our head to the side and thinking "Really??Really???!?" This includes almost the entire movie. Such things includeher not being seen while hanging from a maybe inch wide pole right onthe side of a building when the police look almost directly at her, toscenes where her uncle opens fire near a school district, police showup in 15 seconds, and police don't even come after him while he remainsjust standing there. This also includes a kill where she stabs someonewith the top of pistol into what appears to be the right clavicle(collarbone). I'm assuming it was supposed to be his neck, but itdefinitely didn't look like they even tried to make this lookrealistic. Oh, and it's impossible to leave out the body morphologicalsoftware which is able to match her photo (randomly, it wasn't eveninformation added to the casefile at all) to a very unconvincingsurveillance video. Please waste your time with another action movie.Go watch Die Hard again for the 1,000 time before you see this, you'llbe much happier.
Review total: 20, showing from 1 to 20