Opening 26 May 2011
Directed by:
Joe Wright
Writing credits:
Seth Lochhead, David Farr
Principal actors:
Saoirse Ronan, Eric Bana, Cate Blanchett, Tom Hollander, Paris Arrowsmith
Hanna (Saoirse Ronan) and Erik (Eric Bana) have a very atypical father-daughter relationship. Their remote cabin is hidden in a frozen wilderness; dad teaches Hanna languages, literature, the art of survival, and of killing. “Papa, I’m ready”: Hanna flips the switch thereby forever changing their lives.
Half a world away, intelligence agent Marissa (Cate Blanchett) unleashes operatives, and assassin Isaacs (Tom Hollander), to find the pair. Hanna, a very abnormal teenager, has never lived in society. She takes refuge with a vacationing family, and even becomes friends with daughter Sophia (Jessica Barden): from Morocco to Berlin, Hanna stays one step ahead of her pursuers. Hanna reaches the Grimm House in Berlin where she is to meet dad and, like in the fairy tales, evil is but a breath away.
Although parts of this film are good - the acting, the music - they do not add up to a solid whole. The story, long, fragmented and dull, is not bettered through Joe Wright’s direction and Paul Tothill’s editing. They concentrate too much on the physical action, thus disappointingly lose sight of the psychological drama that could have lifted Hanna’s magnitude to a higher level. (Marinell Haegelin)
