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I have wanted to see Nikita for years. It was on Sky Movies the other day, so we Plussed it. It is very good.

It’s a simple story about a woman who is part of a drugs gang that kills three policemen when they are caught raiding a pharmacy. She’s sent to prison for 30 years, but the government fakes her death and trains her to be an assassin, convincing her that it’s better than the alternative: execution.

How plausible it is, I don’t know, but none of it seemed beyond the realms of possibility. That’s probably because once she has graduated from the training school, the story stops being so much about action and switches focus to show how her violent government job interferes with her private life, and the love that develops between her and the cashier in her local supermarket.

It takes some effort, of course, being in French with subtitles but, as with any foreign film, you quickly forget that you’re reading as it goes along. Just as well, as the French was spoken so quickly that it was only with help from the subtitles that I was able to follow it. I don’t think I’ve yet developed a French-tuned ear.

Overall, though, I’d give it a nine (the film, not my ear), which is more than it gets from the IMDB readers, who award it a 7.6 and warn you not to bother with the American remake starring Bridget Fonda. What is it with American media moguls who insist on remaking everything for the local audience and generally screwing it up?

They’re showing the American version of The Office on BBC3.

It’s dire.

This entry was posted on Sunday, July 31st, 2005 at 10:48 pm and is filed under Media. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.