The Thousands

As Antti Aarne and Stith Thompson recognised, fairytales are just recognisable motifs strung on a narrative like beads. Joe Wright gets this too; Hanna’s spy-chase plot is basically a series of fairytale tropes. From a cottage in the woods with her widowed father, a resourceful heroine battles evil trolls and a wicked witch in magic shoes, and is even swallowed by a giant wolf, emerging into adulthood wiser about herself and the world.

Hanna (Saoirse Ronan) is an ethereal teenager whose rogue-agent dad Erik (Eric Bana) has trained her as a remorseless killing machine with one target: Erik’s old boss, Marissa Wiegler (Cate Blanchett). But rather than a sassy Hit-Girl, innocent Hanna is more like Leeloo from The Fifth Element.

Wright is better known for his elegant period films; there’s no surer sign that he’s new to actioners than the very ’90s way a Chemical Brothers song starts up in every arse-kicking scene. But while Hanna sometimes feels puzzling and insubstantial, its Run Lola Run aesthetic is far wittier than the unremitting bombast of a McG or a Bay. And what other action director would demonstrate familial love via a dorky Bowie singalong in a Kombi van?