An In-Depth Look At Angelina Jolie’s Career Of Kicking Ass

With the upcoming release of Angelina Jolie’s new action/thriller film Salt, it’s hard not to look back and admire the amount of ass that has been kicked. While I’d still put Sigourney Weaver as my favorite female action star, there’s no woman I’d rather watch assault humans on the big screen than Mrs. Jolie.

The Bone Collector (1999)

This film is a small but important early role for Jolie because of how it establishes part of her on-screen action persona. The story follows a quadriplegic ex-cop (Denzel Washington) tracking a serial killer who is abducting people in a taxi and leaving them to die in particularly sadistic ways. Because of his condition, Rhyme recruits Amelia Donaghy (Jolie), into doing most of the physical dirty work in tracking down the killer. The story plays out like a good James Patterson novel and even though it’s part of the predictable Post-Silence of the Lambs serial killer craze, it still holds up because of the two lead performances. While Jolie is by no means a lethal weapon in this movie, she does get to play an empowered female protagonist. The puppeteer-puppet relationship between Washington and Jolie could have gone so many sexist directions but the film dodges any misogynistic overtones. In fact, it’s actually “Jolie to the rescue” at the end of the film and she actually ends up saving Denzel, one of the most macho badass male personas in Hollywood.

Gone in 60 Seconds (2000)

When a retired master car thief (Nicholas Cage) must come back to the industry and steal 50 cars in one night to save his brother’s life, he decides he needs to assemble the A-Team of Grand Theft Auto. The film works mostly because of its entertaining “car-stealing” montages and its lively supporting cast including Vinnie Jones as a semi-psychotic bodyguard  and Robert Duvall as the wise old timer. Then of course there’s Jolie who plays sleazy Sara “Sway” Wayland, mechanic by day and Coyote Ugly bartender by night. The film acts as the second ingredient to Jolie’s recipe for mass destruction. Partly, because this is her first major blockbuster and if she’s not taking names on the big screen in front of a big audience than that action doesn’t have its full effect. More importantly though, is that this is really where we first see her wild side. She’d played the sexual temptress before but she’d never added the extra element of punk-rock to the mix until this film. She doesn’t get much screen time (surprising since she’d just won an Oscar for Girl, Interrupte), but she takes what she’s given and fleshes out her character into more than just a “Megan Foxish” performance.

Lara Croft: Tomb Raider and The Cradle of Life (2001-2003)

Here Jolie plays video-game action star Lara Croft. A female Indiana Jones who, instead of a trusty whip and signature hat, prefers two 9mm pistols and tights. Both films feature Lara searching for buried treasure and saving the world. Both have been completely trashed by the critical community. A trashing that I don’t think is completely deserved. I’ve always had a soft spot for campy action films and think these films really can be enjoyed in the right context. Jolie’s about as essential to these films as Bruce Willis was to the Die Hard franchise. Lara Croft: Tomb Raider is no Die Hard but I feel Jolie’s performance makes the film watchable. Cradle of Life isn’t as strong as its predecessor but going back to the Indiana Jones analogy, I feel that it works as a “Temple of Doom” piece in the sense that it’s a lot fun that only works when you have a pre-established relationship with the main character. Even though Jolie can’t complete redeem either of these films dull plots, I’d still take Lara over Charlie’s Angels any day.

Mr. and Mrs. Smith (2005)

Ah, yes…the birth of Brangelina. Also, and more importantly, the birth of the next phase in Jolie’s action career. With Lara Croft and Gone in 60 Seconds, teenage males had accepted Jolie into their culture, but it wasn’t untill she danced with Brad Pitt in this assassination tango that she was accepted into America’s heart. With on-screen chemistry that even Stevie Wonder could see, these two have no trouble bleeding a pure cinematic charisma that’s hard to take your eyes off of. The film fails when it needs to establish a realistic world for these characters to live in (the beginning) and when it needs to find a logical conclusion for their relationship and careers (the end). However, the middle is executed perfectly. The only must-see part of the entire movie is fight/sex scene and it really reminded me of why I like going to the movies. It’s the only scene I remembered from the movie before revisiting it and it really held up after a second viewing. It’s fun to watch half of their suburban house fall down why they shoot at each other and even better to watch the other half fall down after crazy super spy makeup sex. The film is perfectly acceptable for what it’s trying to be and I think it was a crucial step in solidifying Jolie as America’s “Not So Sweet Sweet-Heart”.

Wanted (2008)

While this isn’t Jolie’s best performance, it might be the best action movie that she’s ever been a part of. Wanted follows Wesley’s (McAvoy) plunge into an underground assassination rabbit hole. The film has a lot of cool and original ideas (like curving bullets) and really dumb nonsensical ideas (like curving bullets). The film’s “take control of your life” preachy bullshit is a little hard to swallow, especially when its moral contradictions are so out in the open, but in the right mindset it’s a fun ride that is very enjoyable on the surface. The beginning of the movie reminded me of the recent film Knight and Day, with Jolie in the Tom Cruise role and McAvoy in the Cameron Diaz role. We quickly move into the cool Gun-Fu training montages followed by a great plot twist and deranged ending. The film really should have given Jolie’s character more time to grow. Half the film she spends her time being her usual sexy self and serves as a kind of love interest to McAvoy’s character. The other half of the film she is training him and acting as a kind of mysterious mentor. The film ends before we can learn what her character really was but I like to think of it as a career transition from the “young woman” phase and into “mother” territory. Jolie’s by no means old but since her image in our culture is now an “adopt the world” maternal figure, it makes sense that she might start to drift away from the Lara Croft character. From the looks of Salt, I’m glad that she’s not hanging up the guns for more dramatic roles and is instead entering a new persona I’ve never really seen before in film: a MILF not afraid to fill the body-bags.