The mind taps twice for salt

Rating: Null/10 (30 August 2010)

Alright, the summary is actually a verse. Does it actually explain anything about the film? No. Perhaps yes. Perhaps perhaps.
Oh, I feel so amused, because this must be one of the best examples I know of brain-washing, ridiculously shifting build-up films. But to what purpose? Can there be such a thing as ambiguous nihilism? Salt is practically mute all the time, so we can not really empathize with what she goes through (although arguably Jolie is at her best here), or what motives there are, if any, because to empathize one has to speak. And when Salt speaks, it is mostly to herself, via flash-backs, that have no actual relief, in the double sense of the word, if one has to talk about double things, since double things, well, semi-happen on screen...
So, if you go for amazing, senseless build-ups, go for it. I won't ask your motive. I didn't have the time to ask myself, since I enjoy it when a director can pick any material and give it some kind of verisimilitude even if it is outrageously far-fetched (as here) but by the end, I was somehow, not pleasingly, exhausted. I recognized the promise of a sequel, that, despite the fact whether I have enjoyed the film or not I find it amusing when it happens, but this time there was some kind of ashen taste in my mouth. Jolie's exploitation of her mega-star status is the ongoing thrust of her movies, but she must resolve what kind of agent she is: super-modern-matriarch, star-on-the-cube, or relentless philanthropist? There is something unforgivably stern in her act.