Point of No Return (1993)
Directed by John Badham
Hardened criminal Maggie Hayward's consistent violence, even in police custody, ends in the execution chamber. However, top-secret US government agent 'Bob' arranges a staged death, so Maggie can be elaborately trained as a phantom killer and subdued into obedience.
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What critics compared Point of No Return to
Films like 2002's "Insomnia" (a remake of Erik Skoldbjærg's excellent original and a rare misstep for Christopher Nolan) and 1993's "Point of No Return" (a rather pale remake of 1990's brilliant Luc Besson film "Nikita") were far inferior to their non-American predecessors.
Red Sparrow is basically La Femme Nikita (and its American remake, Point of No Return) with a Russian accent and a lot more graphic sexual content.
Someone somewhere also thought it a cheeky joke to cast Anne Parillaud in a small role here, but all that does is remind aficionados of assassin cinema about the superior class and gender dynamics at play in La Femme Nikita — not to mention its Americanized remake, Point of No Return.
If you have seen Besson's other films, La Femme Nikita, or Point of No Return staring Bridget Fonda, then you have already watched most of this story with a few extra plot twists thrown in for good measure.
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That the French director Luc Besson, an industrious multi-hyphenate, has a thing for femmes fortes has been evident since 1990, when he unleashed a pouty toothpick in “La Femme Nikita,” a delirious, violent fantasy that turned an outlaw into a gun-toting gamine and an exploitable commodity that, in turn, spawned both an American big-screen remake (“Point of No Return”) and a television series.
Harvey Keitel's "cleaner" character is a reference to Luc Besson's La Femme Nikita and its American remake, Point of No Return.
What follows is a long comic sequence involving a "cleanup man" (Harvey Keitel as The Wolf) who's been borrowed from another movie (the "Femme Nikita" knockoff "Point of No Return") and shows up here in a tuxedo at 8:30 in the morning-at Quentin Tarantino's house (he's playing a quasi-crook).
Tarantino can't resist the impulse to let Travolta dance, or Walken stir up memories of "The Deer Hunter," or Keitel replay his cleanup man from "Point of No Return."