This is an action movie that isn’t stupid, sexed up, or part of a Hasbro toy franchise/comic-book series/theme-park legacy. Of course, it does star Angelina Jolie, a woman that occupies many men’s dreams, but she is never overly sexualised in this film, nor does her character take part in any kinky antics that involve the undoing of a zip. She does take off her knickers at one point, but only to use them to cover a security camera, so we’ll let her off that one.
Jolie plays Evelyn Salt, a CIA agent who is accused of being a Russian “sleeper” spy by an alleged defector bad-guy (Corey Stoll). You know he’s a really nasty, nasty man because his voice gets as near to Christopher Lee’s menacing tones as a fake Russian accent will let him. But anyway, after his accusation hits home with Salt’s colleagues (Liev Schreiber and Chiwetel Ejiofor), she realises she needs to stay clear of the CIA and find her arachnid-obsessed German husband.
I know this sounds utterly ridiculous. It is. But it’s to the film’s credit that it takes itself ultra-seriously and manages to work.
Salt (2010), directed by Phillip Noyce, is released on blu-ray and DVD by Sony Pictures, Certificate 15 (extended cut).
