StunnaKrypto Self-important, over-dramatic, uninspired.

Contentar Best movie of this year hands down!

Livestonth I am only giving this movie a 1 for the great cast, though I can't imagine what any of them were thinking. This movie was horrible

Lollivan It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

cathylr I saw this film when I was Young (12 years old maybe) and I simply loved it. We are following the story of this unruly woman who is trying to do better in a world that is not necessarily that friendly. All the actors are excellent, showing a great strength and sensitivity at the same time. As in most films by Luc Besson, there is a dark sense of humor that could ´speak´ even to the young.

ckckyang I think this film was phenomenal until the ambassador's mission started. The first half of the film was just brilliantly done, the music , the pacing, the acting was just wonderful, I have never felt so much pleasure in a long time since T2: The Judgement Day, the action sequences was one of the best I've ever seen, packed with emotional impact and incredible depth, the first half of this film serves everything what a film should've done. After Nikita left and graduated from the training school, she lived a joyful life and worked professionally, and that's where the second part began, which by far was still an amazing film. The scene where she's in Venice and tried to shot a guy from the window is incredible, she cried while her fiancé was talking to her threw the bathroom's door, that was a powerful scene to me and surely impacted me a lot , but after this scene's finished, this film has started to sag .The character's transformation from here was totally uncompelling , the way Nikita acted so unprofessional and whiny was very weird, as the fact that she's been trained for a long time, she shouldn't be so sad about it , or if she's supposed to be like that, than the motivation should be more convincing, and THAT's where this film has failed, after the believably anding of the second act, it didn't really feel like it, the impact was small, the plot haven't given an enough incidents to carry the weight of the story , and there wasn't enough conflict to convince the audience that her motivation was right , as a result, it didn't feel like there was an ending for the second act until the final mission , which was supposedly being the third act of this film. Than the film ended, left me with a complete shock , and sad, because it's a pity , it could've been a masterpiece , but we got an shattered work instead.

christopher-underwood I can't recall whether I last saw this in the cinema or on video but I do recall liking it a lot and even had a poster on my wall. Coming to it again almost 30 years later I am not quite as impressed. It stuck me as overlong and I found it a bit uneven. There were scenes I was supposed to take seriously and then there were ridiculous sequences with cars ploughing through walls and fight-outs in posh restaurant kitchens with automatic weapons. I should have been on a warning with the opening sequence when there is a super hero comic book response by the police to a potential chemist shop robbery. Then, of course, during the period between viewings I have seen television adaptations. The fabulous French Canadian version, La Femme Nikita with the stunning Peta Wilson and the more recent and more similar to this in tone, US Nikita with Maggie Q. The French Canadian version very much takes the theme set out here but builds on it imaginatively and believably. It has to be said that even if this original film does now disappoint it was a great concept and Luc lesson can take much of the credit for that.

mrrockey When it comes to spy cinema, Americans generally know it through franchises like James Bond, Mission: Impossible, the Bourne series, and... Spy Kids. Those films generally paint two portraits of the spy life. Either glamorous and exotic, or intense and brutal. Nikita is an interesting film in the genre. While it certainly leans more towards the latter, it's one of the very films in the genre that both shows a realistic depiction of spy life but at the same time, stylizes it. But does Nikita work as a film? Let's find out.The plot follows a teenage junkie by the name of Nikita, who gets arrested one night after partaking in a drug store robbery that goes horribly wrong where she murders a policeman in cold-blood, making her guilty of serving a life sentence. However, the French government fakes a suicide for her to become a spy/assassin.What's interesting about Nikita is its look into the life of a spy. This isn't James Bond, there's no gadgets, no witty one-liners, and no larger-than-life villains. What we have INSTEAD, is a look into a woman being turned by the French government from a teenage junkie to a dangerous killing machine. Nikita is a woman who starts out with no meaning in life as she hangs around with junkies and is addicted to drugs herself but after she's trained to be a spy, she becomes a lethal killing machine but in the meantime, becomes refined, mentally stable, and even attractive. What's interesting about this is the MORALITY. On one hand, she MURDERED a policeman, so she deserves punishment but at the same time, once she gets out of spy school, she cares and appreciates not just for her life, but also for society and towards the END, she ditches her mission and runs away to leave the life of a spy. The film's message can be pretty much be chalked up to "everybody deserves a second chance" and it's delivered beautifully because it's not RAMMED down your throat with lines like "Maybe Nikita, deserves another chance. Maybe, she never deserved this in the first place." which would have dumbed down the entire movie.Outside of the morality behind the film, Nikita is also very stylish. Director Luc Besson directs this film with a strange mix of realism and style but somehow, it works! This movie has its fair share of brutal realism with scenes like "the Cleaner" using acid to melt down the bodies of those he killed or Nikita trying to break out by threatening her supervisor, Bob, at gunpoint but there's also scenes of style such as the speech her instructor, Amande tells about femininity and the means of using it or the scenes of Nikita training comically in spy school. The reason this works is because neither styles go too far, so they end up complimenting each other and creating its own style rather than making for something inconsistent and jarring. The cinematography by Thierry Arbogast is also quite good at creating this gritty, stylized look.But with all that good said, this is not a perfect movie. One of its biggest flaws is the confused timeframe presented in the story. The movie spans over years of Nikita training to become a spy but the way it's edited makes it feel like only a few weeks/months have gone by so when one of the heads of the organization says "Nikita has been training here for six years.", you'll just be left sitting there like "Wait, it's been six years?"Another problem is the character of Marco. He's just really bland and uninteresting throughout. He's supposed to be the man who wins Nikita's heart and make her appreciate life more but the thing is, while he seems like a really nice guy, his interactions with Nikita aren't very interesting. He questions her here and there about things like why she never has friends or family over at her place or why she spends so much time in the bathroom ignoring him but it never amounts to anything more than that. I would've liked to see him actually get MAD at her at one point and have an argument play out, I think that would've been a little more interesting.The last of the major problems is the score by Eric Serra. It just sounds incredibly bland and sterile throughout. There's some scenes in the film where I literally felt like ripping my HAIR out because of how mind-inducingly dull it is. Although, I did like the music when "the Cleaner" was taking care of business.However, those problems aren't NEARLY strong enough to ruin the film because of the excellent cast. Anne Parillaud gives a truly spectacular performance as Nikita. Her change from teenage junkie to refined assassin is very believable and all her conflicting emotions about being a spy feel very real and believable. Tcheky Karyo plays Bob fascinatingly with a polite persona but with an underlying intensity that makes you really think and question his feelings towards Nikita effectively. While I thought his character was a little bland, Jean- Hugues Anglade does the best he can as Marco and remains likable the entire film. Lastly, while "the Cleaner" doesn't get a whole lot of screen time, Reno stands out as a cool and bada$$ character in the film.Overall, while it has some issues regarding the timeframe, the character of Marco, and the score. Nikita is still an interesting character study with stylish direction and an excellent cast. 8/10