Film Pick of the Week: Heart of Stone - review by Yvette Huddleston

She plays Rachel Stone who as the film opens is with her team of MI6 agents – Parker (Jamie Dornan), Yang (Jing Lusi) and Bailey (Paul Ready) – in the Italian Alps as they attempt to extract an arms dealer called Mulvaney from a ritzy cocktail party in a luxury mountaintop hotel. Stone is a techie not a field agent so she is required to ‘stay in the van’ but then a computer glitch means that she has to enter the party herself. Things start to go pear-shaped when Yang is caught trying to sedate Mulvaney and a gunfight ensues. Parker manages to get Mulvaney to a cable car and Bailey and Yang follow. Stone slips and appears to be injured but that turns out to be just a ploy as she makes contact with her real employer The Charter, an organisation run by the formidable Nomad (Sophie Okonedo).

The Charter are a group of elite former agents constantly surveilling operations around the world who go in to help when security services and governments make a mess of things. The organisation depends for all their information and support on a supercomputer known as ‘the heart’. It is all-seeing and all-powerful and therefore attractive to people who are intent on global domination. In this case the ‘villain’ is young computer prodigy Keya Dhawan (Alia Bhatt), although when her motive is revealed, it sheds a different light on things.

Stone eventually breaks cover when she disobeys orders from Nomad and the Heart in order to save her MI6 colleagues when they are ambushed on a mission in Lisbon. The Portuguese capital is one of the many glamorous locations that the narrative speeds off to in a series of high-octane set pieces that feature explosions, impressive stunts and car chases aplenty. Plotwise it is all a bit preposterous and very derivative – it is clearly seeking to emulate the blockbuster feel of both the Mission Impossible and Bond franchises. That said, however, it does keep the viewer engaged and frequently on the edge of your seat. There is also a great cameo from Glenn Close as one of the Charter’s senior operatives. Gadot’s character is strong, capable and more than holds her own against the legions of baddies standing in the way of her completing her mission. It is female empowerment writ large.