Netflix ‘s “ Trigger Warning ” is the kind of sturdy thriller that recalls movies from “ First Blood ” and “Commando” to the early John Cena vehicle “The Marine” and the 2004 remake of “Walking Tall”: a military veteran returns home, looking for peace, only to face violent antagonists who force him back into action. The difference is that in “Trigger Warning,” the veteran is a woman (Jessica Alba), and the voice behind the camera is female also, as Indonesian director Mouly Surya makes her English-language debut. It’s not just Surya’s first American project after a series of acclaimed films in her home country but also her first action movie.
As she told IndieWire, Surya was determined to deliver the traditional satisfactions of the genre while also exploring what it meant to have a woman in a role typically occupied by actors like Stallone, Schwarzenegger, and The Rock. “I think from the get-go, I wanted a more intimate style of fighting,” Surya said. To that end, she leaned into the idea of Alba using a knife as her character Parker’s weapon of choice.
“If you want to kill a guy with a gun, you can be six feet away, but with the kind of blade that Jessica has throughout the film , you have to be very close to your enemy.” Alba’s proficiency with the knife not only infuses her odyssey of revenge with a greater intimacy and more personal touch but makes the action more convincing. It’s a skill Aba acquired over months of training an.
