Kite 
                                      
Director: Ralph Ziman
Year: 2014
Rating: 5.5
Now this is the film people should see rather than Sound of Freedom if they want to see child traffickers tracked down and killed. Killed in various violent ways. By a teenage girl. Who is being coached by Samuel Jackson. This is basically a B low budget film that looks like it should have gone straight to video but apparently got a theatrical release - probably for a day and a half. This is the sort of film that seems tailor-made for a fuck-up fanboy like me. When it comes to female killers, I ask for very little - that she be sleek and attractive - have they ever made one in which she isn't? - and that she kills evil guys who deserve it - lots of them. This delivers on that. It seems to have struck few other bells with the critics or movie goers. On Rotten Tomatoes it gets a big fat zero from the critics and 18% from the audience. It makes me wonder if something is wrong with my taste. Probably but I enjoyed this though knowing while watching it that it was ridiculous and predictable. Ultra-violent.



It is some time in the future - the way things are going, perhaps the near future. The government is gone, everything looks like a slum with crumbling buildings, gangs run society, there is a police force but it is mainly corrupt, children are being taken and sold and drugs are always available. It is based on a Japanese manga by Yasuomi Umetsu. In this dysfunctional setting there lives a teenage girl named Sawa. She is a cutie. In the opening scene a man grabs her seemingly drunk and takes her into an elevator - an elderly lady looks on and he kicks her - big mistake as Sawa takes out a gun and shoots him. And waits for his head to explode. Bullets have delayed mini-bombs. She walks away and takes off her red wig. Still a cutie. She is played by India Eisley who at the time looks like she was made to play Lolita. Lolita with a big fucking gun and a grudge.



Her cop father was killed by one of the top gang leaders who traffics little girls. In the American way, she is working her way up the ladder with dead bodies. Her handler played by Jackson was the partner of her father and he helps her with weapons and advice and a push in the right direction. He had a prodigy on his hands. He also supplies her with drugs that make you forget. Filmed in South Africa and directed by Ralph Ziman - trashy, just the way I like it. At times you wonder how Jackson ended up in this film.