Rose has the poise to carry this action movie about an alpha mama collecting money from narcotics nasties, but it’s cartoonish
![Vanquish review – Ruby Rose slugs it out on a motorbike](https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/662898269681ab3a5f2ce928d0d5523b582e3d61/350_105_3425_2055/master/3425.jpg?width=1200&height=630&quality=85&auto=format&fit=crop&overlay-align=bottom%2Cleft&overlay-width=100p&overlay-base64=L2ltZy9zdGF0aWMvb3ZlcmxheXMvdGctcmV2aWV3LTIucG5n&enable=upscale&s=42e5ab7cce3bcd09634ce9ae8e6b060f)
With the superhero’s gentrification of the blockbuster business, there is little space any more for big-budget original action movies. So up-and-comers such as Ruby Rose – seen earlier this year opposite Jean Reno in The Doorman – are forced to slug it out in the B-movie arena, from where there’s no guarantee they’ll ever emerge into stardom. Rose looks great – her androgynous poise reminiscent of the young
Angelina Jolie – and does a capable
Job carrying Vanquish. But you wonder if this noir-filtered, John Wick-apeing thriller is a little too stripped-back for its own good to advance her career.
Rose plays Victoria, carer to Damon (Morgan Freeman), a wheelchair-bound retired cop whose ridiculously upscale mansion hints at off-the-books income. But she has a secret past, too: as a top drug courier in
Berlin for the
Russian mafia. So when Damon decides to call in money from his narcotics contacts, he forces Victoria to make the five stops necessary – and takes her daughter hostage as insurance. The alpha mama takes to her superbike for a whistlestop underworld tour, strapped up with a helmet and chestcam letting her blackmailer eyeball her rendezvous.