After supporting roles in blockbusters like Wicked, Michelle Yeoh has her first all out starring role since winning the Best Actress Oscar for Everything Everywhere All At Once three years ago. Considering her expertise in martial arts and kick ass action (Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon for starters), her latest effort in the genre is a lot of fun, but not for squeamish stomachs since The Surgeon makes The Pitt look like Paw Patrol. This medical thrill ride holds nothing back in exploring the human anatomy as weaponry that even John Wick would envy. Maybe we should call this one John Sick. Who needs a gun when you bring on instant death just by pulling out the colon and squeezing for 30 seconds. This movie from writer/director Dr. Roshan Sethi (A Nice Indian Boy) is a manual for turning bad guys inside out – literally.
There can be no doubt what attracted Yeoh, a supreme action star as well as serious actor, to the role of Eliza, a world renowned surgeon who has followed her Monastic code of medicine for 40 years and now is retiring. Early on a phone call from her insurance company says it all: “Should we continue insuring your hands?” and the answer is no, no longer necessary. But those plans to take it all easy are rudely interrupted when she is abducted at gunpoint by criminals and ordered to operate on their gravely ill leader, Sean (Martin Freeman). Apparently she is the only hope this crime boss has, and his henchmen, notably Cole (Yuri Kolokolnikov), an imposing Russian bad guy is watching closely to make sure she does what she is ordered to do as she cuts him open, starts removing organs, and proceeds to make the weakest among us want to reach for the barf bag. Prosthetics supervisor Suzi Battersby leaves little to the imagination. Congratulations, Suzi.
Eliza senses once she has done the job she will be killed, but they have come to play with the wrong doc. She does make one demand, that they crank up the Thin Lizzy songs, her preferred music to cut by. It doesn’t take long before she uses her exceptional ability to turn every key body part into a death sentence, particularly in a clock ticking demonstration of how lethal her hands can be when she sets about slicing and dicing with her scalpel. Yeoh’s martial arts skills really come into play in battling these guys by manipulating their mobility in delightfully paralyzing ways.
We get a little more info on Sean in a flashback to her initial meeting with him where they talked about his dire diagnosis and knew she was likely his only ticket to live. So how could he accept she had hung up her scrubs?
In the tight 92 minute running time, Dr. Sethi shows his own bonafides by making a truly original action flick that may be the most informative trip inside the body since Fantastic Voyage. Although Freeman creates a fairly dimensional character while the other baddies are strictly stereotypes, it is Yeoh that makes this enterprise worth watching. She not only still have the action chops, she is completely believable and authentic as a doctor who has seen it all and possesses extraordinary talent in the profession. Her last stand in the operating room is one to behold.
Shout out to fight choreographer Laurent Demanioff for the dazzling moves. There can be no doubt this film, which had its world premiere tonight at the Toronto International Film Festival, is a tailor made vehicle guaranteed to turn up the temperature for Yeoh fans everywhere all at once.
Producers are Basil Iwanyk, Erica Lee, Diarmaid McGrath, Tim Headington, Lia Buman, Neil Shah, Steve Klinsky, Adam Kolbrenner, John Schoenfelder, Russell Ackerman.
Title: The Surgeon
Festival: Toronto – Centerpiece
Director/Screenwriter: Dr. Roshan Sethi
Cast: Michelle Yeoh, Martin Freeman, Laurie Davidson, Yuri Kolokolnikov, Joseph Mydell
Running Time: One Hour and 32 Minutes
Sales Agent: WME; 193(International Sales)
