There are almost enough moments of low-level fun to be had in Wingwomen, Mélanie Laurent’s easy, breezy attempt to make a French action comedy polished enough to compete with Hollywood counterparts. The sub-genre has become exhausting of late, the sight of a couple quipping while involved in a pop-soundtracked action setpiece starting to border on parody, especially in this year’s atrocious Chris Evans-Ana de Armas disaster Ghosted. But Laurent, to her credit as director, is less interested in how a shootout can work as an aphrodisiac, and more invested in how it would affect a female friendship.
And so the first time we see her and BFF, played by Adèle Exarchopoulos, fresh from Passages, they’re bantering about the latter’s lacklustre love life while trying to avoid getting shot at by some fighter drones. It’s certainly more novel than we’re used to, but only superficially, and with some messy editing and perfunctory quips, it’s an opener resting solely on the shoulders of its two leads. The same can be said for most of the film, Laurent and Exarchopoulos doing some strenuous grunt work to make Wingwomen feel as light-footed as it does. They play ride-or-dies who work together for the Godmother (a vampy, underused Isabelle Adjani), who gives them high-risk missions around Europe. But when Carole (Laurent) wants a new life, they find that, surprise of surprises, getting out is a lot harder than getting in.
