TV Times

TV Times

‘Elektra’:The sizzling heroine in red attire
Elektra combines the cinematic skills of a high powered team of film makers. Director Bowman produced and directed numerous episodes of “The X-Files,” for which he received three Golden Globe Awards and three Emmy Award nominations. In 1998 he brought “The X-Files” characters to the big screen as the director of “The X-Files” feature film. The screen writer for the movie Zak Penn has written screenplays for numerous feature films including “X2,” “Behind Enemy Lines,” “PCU” and “Last Action Hero.”

Jennifer Garner originated the role of Elektra Natchios in the hit Twentieth Century Fox / Regency Enterprises movie “Daredevil” based on the Marvel comic. Garner co-starred opposite Ben Affleck in the film, which also featured Colin Farrell, Michael Clarke Duncan and Jon Favreau.

In this aspect ELEKTRA gave Garner the opportunity to explore a character she had created on screen a year earlier. “At the end of ‘Daredevil’ we left Elektra at the beginning of her real darkness,” says Garner. “When we pick her up in this movie, there’s a wall of ice around her. She’s so isolated from the outside world that she doesn’t even know she is isolated anymore.”

In this movie the filmmakers made the most out of Elektra’s special qualities within the comic book universe. Unlike most comic book heroes, Elektra possesses no super-human physical powers. Instead, she makes maximum use of her incredible physical prowess and martial arts skills. In addition, she has the ability to see into the future, a skill known as Kimagure, which she has honed through countless hours of deep meditation.

Explaining the story line Producer Avi Arad says “In our story Stick lets Elektra go and then he puts her through a test. It’s a do or die situation. Elektra has a contract to fulfill to terminate a father and her daughter who are on the run from a group of ninja assassins known as The Hand but that same father and daughter help Elektra remember the brighter days of her own life, when she and her father were together. Her mission derails her personal agenda, forces her out of her cynical attitude, and sets her on the road to redemption.”

Key players in Elektra’s journey are Stick, a blind martial arts master responsible for Elektra’s “resurrection,” and Mark Miller and Abby Miller, a father and daughter on the run from The Hand, a powerful syndicate whose members practice the dark martial art of ninjitsu.

The relationship between Stick and Elektra, sensei and pupil, is central to the story. Stick is the puppet-master, setting events in motion and then intervening only when necessary to guide his students progress. “Elektra wants Stick to be her sensei, but she doesn’t want to do what he tells her to do,” says Stamp.

“Although he often appears to be giving up on her, he has a kind of overview, a way of getting her to do what he wants by hook or by crook, so to speak. In the East they say that the guru needs the great pupil even more that the great pupil needs the guru. So I think there is a kind of symbiosis in their relationship.”

According to star of the feature she had trained long and hard to do justice to the character portrayed in the famed Marvel comics: a warrior without limits. Already physically fit and skilled in various fighting techniques from her work on the television series “Alias,” Garner has taken her martial arts training to a new level under the guidance of ELEKTRA’s Stunt Coordinators and Fighting Choreographers.

A bonus for Garner - and the comic’s multitude of fans - was that this time Elektra would don a red costume that stays true to the colors worn by the character in the Marvel stories.

The movie has made good on the opening days of the box office but has come under extensive criticism by some movie critics. Still others say that marvel studios have not lost its spirit in this type of movies. But some waiting for the next anticipated big hit from Marvel the “Fantastic Four”.

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