Canary Black follows the story of highly skilled CIA agent Avery Graves (Kate Beckinsale). A mysterious criminal group has blackmailed Graves into stealing top-secret data called “Canary Black” in exchange for her kidnapped husband’s life. Graves has no choice but to betray her country. It turns out that the Canary Black is a codename for a system that can shut down a targeted country’s entire internet connections, thus possibly sparking a modern doomsday.
Canary Black starts off with Graves single-handedly taking down some Japanese criminals in a boring fighting scene that might cause the audience to set low expectations. Graves’ wig in the opening scene is also quite distracting because of how bad it is.
The action only started to pick up after Graves started to look for the Canary Black. A personal favorite fighting scene is when Graves beats up a CIA prisoner to look for the Canary Black — which one might expect to look like a mini chip — hidden inside the inmate’s fake tooth. The rest of the action is okay — some actually pump your adrenaline, while others are simply just there for the plot.
Some dialogues in “Canary Black” can get confusing especially when Graves and her fellow CIA agents make references to past cases. The plot twist about her husband’s true identity is also somewhat predictable. The movie ends with Graves being recruited by a group of agents specified for high-risk missions. This ending is quite unexpected in the sense that it leaves doors for a sequel — although that would likely have to depend on whether “Canary Black” is commercially successful.
Canary Black is an American action-thriller spy film directed by Pierre Morel and written by Matthew Kennedy. The film stars Kate Beckinsale as a CIA agent on the run. In August 2024, Amazon announced that Canary Black would be released on their streaming service Prime Video on October 24, 2024.
Canary Black was first introduced at the 2022 Cannes Film Market as a spy thriller directed by Pierre Morel, written by Matthew Kennedy, and starring Kate Beckinsale. At the American Film Market later that year, the first images of the production were released as Anton put the film up for sale.
Filming began in Croatia in October 2022, and it would continue through January 2023. Filming took place primarily in Zagreb, where shooting interrupted service for several trams in Zagreb to control the environment of the outdoor action sequences, which included Beckinsale flying over the city from a drone and hanging from rooftops. Filming in Zagreb utilized the Dinamo Zagreb’s Stadion Maksimir as a movie set, and the city of Rovinj doubled for Tokyo.
Canary Black (2024)
Directed by: Pierre Morel
Starring: Kate Beckinsale, Rupert Friend, Ray Stevenson, Saffron Burrows, Ben Miles, Goran Kostić, Michael Brandon, Charles Nishikawa, Emma Gojkovic, Romina Tonkovic, Ramona Von Pusch
Screenplay by: Matthew Kennedy
Production Design by: Sebastian T. Krawinkel
Cinematography by: Thierry Arbogast
Film Editing by: Tania Goding
Costume Design by: Nikolina Kostanjsek
Set Decoration by: Bülent Akgün
Art Direction by: Patrick Herzberg, Klara Niksic, Danijel Zavrski
Music by: Jessica Rose Weiss
MPAA Rating: R for violence and language.
Distributed by: Amazon MGM Studios
Release Date: October 24, 2024
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