Zoe's parents are killed by a fellow drug dealer in Columbia. As the assassins confront this 10 year old girl, she makes a daring "Spiderman" escape. She ends up in Chicago where she is raised by her uncle. "I want to be a warrior-princess," she says. She wants to be a killer.

We flash forward to her adulthood. Zoe has become a killer and she leaves a calling card by drawing a rare orchid on the victim, a sign of her family. Her goal, to the dismay of her uncle, is to draw out the man who killed her parents...who has the backing of the CIA.

Lennie James plays Ross, a sharp FBI investigator, who is in charge of finding the the rare orchid killer.

Zoe's ability reminded me a bit of Jolie in "Salt." While Zoe is leggy and sexy, don't get you hopes up, as the camera angel remains pure while she showers and changes. I found the action scenes to be 5 stars. The scenes with Lennie James were also excellent. The filler drama material of Zoe's life outside of the action scenes was not well scripted and I lost interest waiting for something to happen.

Eventually the plot and subplot comes together in a most entertaining way as we find out that Zoe knows how to take charge.

The biggest disaster of the movie was the closing soundtrack. I mean really. That was the best they could do?

Good action, fair drama

A while back, Luc Besson set up a scheme whereby he would write and produce a number of high-octane action movies, while at the same time allowing one of his protégés to direct. The results are sometimes middling - such as FROM Paris WITH LOVE - and sometimes very good, like the recent Guy Pearce starrer LOCKOUT. Sadly, COLOMBIANA is more middling than good, as everything about it is overly familiar.

The story sees a young woman out for revenge against the Colombian drug lord who had her parents slaughtered. Yawn. While there are the requisite assassination scenes and fights (including a pretty good bout in a bathroom),much of the film is slightly dull with lots of scenes copied from other movies. The police investigation resembles the one in the BOURNE films, there are blatant lifts from LEON (like the attack on the apartment) and overall there's a sense of weariness to the proceedings.

It's also rather silly. Zoe Saldana plays a character who seems to have been inspired by Ethan Hunt from the MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE series, and at times there's a superhero feel to the whole thing. It's fair to say that Saldana's acting is pretty poor, and the supporting characters are too predictable to allow anyone to make much of an impact (including the reliable Lennie James). The one good thing is that Olivier Megaton is getting better as director; this is an improvement over TRANSPORTER 3, while TAKEN 2 was an improvement over this. One day he might actually make a genuinely good film!

In Bogota Columbia 1992, young Cataleya (Zoe Saldana) witnesses the murder of her parents by Don Luis. She escapes with valuable info that she delivers to the US embassy. She runs away to her gangster uncle Emilio Restrepo (Cliff Curtis) in Chicago who trains her to be an assassin. 15 years later in California, she grows up to be a skilled killer for Restrepo as she works to take revenge.

It's another Luc Besson script where a woman kicks some butt. Director Olivier Megaton does pretty good action like the chase through the slums of Bogota. Zoe Saldana doesn't get into the movie until after 30 minutes. She does a lot of fighting action and walks around in skimpy outfits. There isn't much more acting otherwise. This is strictly a slick well made exploitation movie.