Review of Birds of Prey, directed by Cathy Yan

I remember all those years ago when The Suicide Squad came out in theaters, and I, for some reason, decided to go see it. Back then I was sixteen, and some friends wanted to see it, which is probably why I even bothered.

Those days I really did not care about superhero or comic book movies, and to this day, I still don’t really care for the genre and don’t show up for the latest Marvel movie releases unless someone asks me to go with them on my subscription.

So you’re probably wondering what really compelled me to go and see Birds of Prey. I was really bored one weekday after I had finished up my finals for graduate school, so what I did was rot my brain by watching movies.

I saw this film had been recently added to Netflix, and I impulsively decided to watch it despite my reservations.

And that was how I spent my afternoon that day. It certainly was an interesting movie, that’s for sure.

Let’s get into the review then, shall we?

Harley Quinn decides to rebuild her life after splitting up with the Joker, but with a dramatic flair.

Although we never physically see the Joker on-screen in this movie, the film begins with him breaking up with her. No longer with a place to live, Harley is stuck on the streets, forced to fend for herself without the man she had devoted herself to for so many years now.

She’s lucky when she meets Doc, who runs a Taiwanese restaurant, and he allows her the chance to live upstairs from his restaurant and rebuild her life. She cuts her hair, buys some roller skates, and decides to adopt a hyena in order to get her life back on track.

But when she’s at a nightclub one night, Harley has had one too many drinks, and ends up mauling a crime lord’s driver after the guy insults her.She peaces out, and then she meets a singer, Dinah, who helps her when she’s in a tough situation.

Dinah ends up getting recruited by the crime lord, Sionis, after he sees her moves with fighting. Harley gets drunk again not long after this, and decides to blow up Ace Chemicals in order to show she’s moved on from the Joker—but in a public manner.

This backfires immediately, as people realize the Joker is helping her out anymore. All of Harley’s old enemies start showing up, not allowing her the chance to enjoy a simple breakfast sandwich, putting her in the path of Detective Renee Montoya.

Renee has been tracking down a girl with a crossbow that’s been taking down mobsters. At the same time, Sionis gives one of his men an important diamond, but the young pickpocket Cass ends up stealing it instead.

Harley ends being kidnapped by Sionis, who tells her to track down the diamond or he’ll kill her. She finds Cass, breaks her out of her jail cell, and they go off together.

Doc is approached by Huntress, the crossbow girl who’s an orphan belonging to a wealthy family (where said diamond came from). Doc ends up betraying Harley later for money, and her apartment goes down in flames as she as Cass watch.

This puts everyone in a crash collision to meet, Dinah is caught betraying Sionis, and all of the women decide to forma. team to take down Sionis.

Cass is captured by him (earlier in the movie she swallowed the diamond, making it impossible to get it out of her unless she’s dead or goes to the bathroom), and they go on a new mission.

Harley dons her rollerskates and chases after Sionis, and Harley outsmarts Sionis as a grenade blows him to bits.

At the end of the movie, Renee quits the police, as she knew they didn’t appreciate anything she did, Huntress, Dinah, and her form a crime group called Birds of Prey. Harley and Cass go off and sell the diamond, starting a business in the process.

Overall Thoughts

Some movies really aren’t good at the whole meta humor thing, but I thought that Birds of Prey did a decent job between balancing the seriousness, action, and humor to create something that was entertaining to watch.

Margot Robbie is such a gem, and I think she does a great job as Harley Quinn if we’re going to be honest.

All of this said, I know nothing about Quinn outside of the random movies I’ve watched, so I can’t comment on whether this is a story that does her justice and liberates her from male dominated narratives.

But all in all, I enjoyed this movie. I didn’t think it was high art, but it certainly was fun to watch during this random Tuesday morning when I had nothing else to do.

Don’t think I’ll be revisiting it anytime soon, but I enjoyed it and was glad I watched it when I did—because who knows if I would’ve watched it otherwise.

Follow me below on Instagram and Goodreads for more.