Salt

Stars: Angelina Jolie, Liev Schreiber. Chiwetel Ejiofor, Andre Braugher, Daniel Olbrychski, August Diehl, Hunt Block

Director: Phillip Noyce

I lost the plot of this action thriller about five minutes in. But a gauntly blonde Angelina Jolie plays CIA agent Evelyn Salt, whom we meet being rescued from North Korean torture (oh, those North Koreans) in a hostage swap.

Two year later, still with the CIA but married to the German arachnologist who helped rescue her, Salt's world falls apart when she is fingered by a Russian defector as a Soviet agent.

Taking her shoes off, she flees, taking a taxi to her home to pick up guns and stuff (what does she pay with? Probably best not to ask) before spectacularly escaping in a freeway chase and hatching a plan to assassinate the visiting Russian premier and return to her covert Soviet paymasters. Or does she? Come on, this is Angelina Jolie we're talking about, and an absurd but pretty well non-stop action plot where villains turn into heroes and vice versa.

Our girl throws herself into the whole ridiculous farrago as convincingly as any testosterone-driven male, and it's no surprise to learn that Salt 2 is already in the works.

David Quinlan

USA 2010. UK Distributor: Sony (Columbia). Colour by deluxe.
100 minutes. Widescreen. UK certificate: 12A.

Guidance ratings (out of 3): Sex/nudity 0, Violence/Horror 1, Drugs 0, Swearing 0.

Review date: 15 Aug 2010