In Birds of Prey, Mary Elizabeth Winstead played Huntress (a.k.a. the crossbow killer), wilding out alongside Margot Robbie’s Harley Quinn, and now she’s back with some extreme John Wick-ish fight choreography in Kate. Check out the first trailer that we’re debuting exclusively here.
Directed by Cedric Nicolas-Troyan, the movie follows an assassin named Kate who blows an assignment in Tokyo, and then discovers she’s been poisoned by a Yakuza organization. She realizes she has less than 24 hours to exact revenge on her killers as her body swiftly deteriorates, so Kate forms an unlikely bond with the “spunky teenage daughter” of one of her past victims, who says at one point: “Kate, you’re like that person in a nightmare. Take no shit from no dudes,” she says. “Just total killer, babe.” The cast also includes Tadanobu Asano, Miyavi, Michiel Huisman, Miku Martineau, Jun Kunimura, and Woody Harrelson.
Along with applauding Winstead on the “visceral and extremely raw aspect” of her action performances (she did all her own stunts), Nicolas-Troyan describes the action movie as a “love letter” to Japan as well.
“The movie is stuffed with Japanese cultural references: the Lawson convenience stores, the vending machines, the pop culture (with the classic Galactic Wars TV show largely inspired by Star Wars), the anime manga culture (with Tokyo Ghoul) and the music,” he explains. “All the needle drops in the film are there to celebrate Japanese female artists of all genres: metal, pop, ballad, hip-hop, and just plain weird.”
Kate releases in select theaters and on Netflix on September 10th.