How
is a criminally insane plastic surgeon like the Islamist Iranian regime? They
both perform unwelcome gender reassignment surgeries. While the Islamist
mullahs do so out of homophobia, Dr. Rachel Jane does out for revenge. In more
forgiving moments, she also sees at as opportunity for the hitman who killed
her brother to find redemption in a new life and gender, but mostly it is just
about payback. Of course, that means the former Frank Kitchen will have to get
revenge for her revenge in Walter Hill’s The
Assignment (trailer
here),
which opens tomorrow in New York.
Kitchen
is good at his job, so it rather irks him when San Francisco gangster Honest
John double crosses him. However, it really pushes his nose out of joint when
he wakes up as a woman. Apparently, he whacked Dr. Jane’s deeply indebted
drug-addled brother, as well as a ne’er do well relative of Honest John—hence their
alliance.
Despite
the hormones, Kitchen is still the same stone cold killer inside, which is the
whole point of the film. With the help of Johnnie, his incredibly understanding
one-night-stand from a couple nights before, who conveniently happens to be a
nurse, Kitchen recuperates to the point that the killer can kill again.
Pronouns are really tricky with respect to Assignment,
because Kitchen still identifies as male, but in any event, our lead character
will start picking off Honest John’s lieutenants, working towards the gangster
and the surgeon, who narrates the tale in media res from the comfort of her looney
bin straight jacket.
It
is tempting to defend Assignment just
because it makes so many people apoplectic. In the current hyper-sensitive
climate, the nobility and victimhood of transgender characters are
sacrosanct. There is simply no room for a lurid pulp anti-hero like Kitchen.
That is a shame, because the kneejerk chorus of boos has a chilling effect.
Conceivably, it could make a serious film about Iranian forced gender
reassignments harder to produce, as a for instance.
In
this case, it also means Sigourney Weaver’s wonderfully campy scenery chewing
as Dr. Jane gets thrown out with the bathwater. It is great fun to watch her
quote Shakespeare and condescendingly talk down to her inferiors, which pretty
much includes everybody. On the other hand, Michelle Rodriguez’s growling Frank
Kitchen voice sounds utterly ridiculous. Still, her prosthetic chest hair and
other stuff are sufficiently lifelike in pre-op scenes.
