Bounty Hunter/Dog Walker/Mercenary: Harley Quinn (& Women in General) Can Do It All–Including Draw Inspiration From Nikki Finn

Just like that iconic opening animated sequence in Who’s That Girl, from the moment of Birds of Prey (and the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn)’s–not unlike the title Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)–introduction, we’re given a fast-paced (and yes, animated) explanation as to why Harley (Margot Robbie, loving every second of this role) is in the very large pickle she’s in: all thanks to losing The Joker’s, well, pickle. Being his moll, of sorts, in Gotham for so long might have fostered an abusive relationship, but it also meant immunity from just about any consequences for her petulant behavior (from daring The Joker to tattoo a guy’s face to breaking a man’s legs–granted, he did call her a slut, and that’s just really not acceptable anymore unless we’re talking more about Chaucer’s era of the meaning: literally unclean; unkempt, inattentive to appearance). Yet after The Joker callously breaks up with her for the last time (something in character with Jared Leto’s Joker, not sensitive Joaquin Phoenix’s), she’s left out in the proverbial cold with a massive bounty on her head as most every resident and power player of Gotham has a reason to want to take her out, be it of small or large motive. 

Yet Harley, a forever inherently “jovial” “soul” ignoring the bleak realities in front of her (including her father’s rejection of her after trading her for a six-pack of beer in a similar vein to a Charles Manson childhood story), refuses to acknowledge just how massive that bounty is until something she truly loves is lost: her perfectly made breakfast sandwich. Yes, that’s right, and no one makes them like Sal (surprisingly not of Italian descent), who she goes to one morning after a bender to cure her hangover with this magical muse of a panacea. Her rough night had concluded with setting the chemical plant, Ace Chemicals, where she and Joker cemented their love, ablaze by driving a gasoline truck into it. It was one of her brilliant ideas that she can only get when completely shitfaced. Yet the brilliance feels slightly blockheaded as she’s relentlessly pursued by Renee Montoya (Rosie Perez), one of the only cops in Gotham willing to take the risk on building a case against crime lord Roman Sionis a.k.a. Black Mask (Ewan McGregor). To her, Harley is just another menace to be eradicated, even if it means costing Harley her prized and beloved sandwich, spread into imperfect pieces on the pavement after Harley is knocked down by Renee. Of course, she escapes, just as Nikki Finn does from everyone in pursuit of her throughout the city as she tries to clear her name for a crime she didn’t commit (well, Harley did do the chemical plant thing, but she’s above suspicion in other accusations). Granted, Harley is no innocent here (and neither is Finn, fond of shoplifting and generally causing chaos with her force of nature ways while she takes Loudon Trott [Griffin Dunne] along for the ride), but she’s certainly not as vile as Roman or his serial killing henchman, Victor Zsasz (Chris Messina, looking like Anthony Kiedis). Roman’s sadistic pleasures come alive in the nighttime, which is precisely why he moonlights as a club owner, with a starring act by the name of Black Canary a.k.a. Dinah Lance (Jurnee Smollett-Bell). Her tortured rendition of “It’s A Man’s Man’s Man’s World” is just one of many standout musical moments in the film (save for when it surrenders to the tired usage of Heart’s “Barracuda” for a “female empowerment” scene), including the playing of Kesha’s “Woman” during the concluding sequence. More than a musical standout, however, it showcases one of her latent superpowers with a voice that could literally kill thanks to her hypersonic screaming abilities (look out, Ariana). 

Although she’s the silent type, she doesn’t hide her equally as contemptuous as everyone else’s opinion of Harley while the latter sloshes around drunkenly at the bar, asking Dinah, “You know what a harlequin is? A harlequin’s role is to serve. It’s nothin’ without a master. No one gives two shits who we are beyond that.” She’s referring, of course, not just to Dinah’s dynamic with Roman, but her own with The Joker. For so long conflating her identity with his to ignore that she was being used as a pawn. With a jacket that once proudly touted, “Property of Joker,” Harley’s emancipation is fantabulous indeed, as she starts to find her own voice and go against those who would tell her she isn’t the sort to stand on her own. That she’s just a useless little girl without The Joker at her side to make waves. In this way, everything about Birds of Prey is an unbridled war cry, a declaration of independence for women everywhere who still think they need to rely on a no-good “powerful” male alliance in order to be taken seriously. Which is precisely the kind of thinking that has still made it impossible to get a female candidate in the lead during a campaign for U.S. president. Critiques of the film that state it’s all surface favoring style over substance fail to take this message into account, it appears.

And as Harley, in her tough-talking, semi-Brooklyn accent (again, it’s sheer Nikki Finn), navigates the contentious waters washing toward her, a young pickpocket and aspiring criminal named Cassandra Cain (Ella Jay Basco) finds herself at the center of her own eye in a storm after plucking the highly coveted Bertinelli diamond from Victor Zsasz’s pocket (the lowdown on the Bertinelli diamond is a prime example of Harley’s charmingly disjointed storytelling, and one that introduces us to Huntress [Mary Elizabeth Winstead], who definitely deserves her own movie as well). 

Victor, who was entrusted to keep it safe for his highly irascible boss, yet couldn’t defend his oblivion against this “demure Asian” preadolescent. Indeed, relative to the usual precedent, there’s an abundance of Asian women at the forefront for once in helming a comic book-sprung blockbuster, director Cathy Yan (the first Asian woman to take on a DC Comics movie) and writer Christina Hodson work seamlessly together not only to bring a deeper, richer layer to Harley’s character, but also this rough-hewn street urchin called Cassandra. With no viable parental influence, she takes an immediate shine to what she considers to be Harley’s glamorous life (living in a ramshackle above a Chinese restaurant with a hyena named Bruce–in tongue-in-cheek homage to Bruce Wayne). For Harley, this is a welcome perspective, for she’s quite accustomed to being viewed as less than trash, which, as her own psych degree would tell you, only further fuels her penchant for being a trainwreck/catalyst for destruction. Like Vivian Ward said, “People put you down enough, you start to believe it.” Therefore play into their preconceived notions of you with all the more caricatured gusto. 

With regard to the presence of a “lovable” hyena for a pet, he’s something of a foil to Murray the cougar in Who’s That Girl–a “cat” Loudon is charged with picking up for his philanthropist boss, but who ends up on the loose thanks to Nikki, the only person who can coax him to do anything–the cat, not just Loudon. For it’s always the broads with the hardest shell that are the biggest of softies on the inside, automatically appealing to animals. And maybe it’s not a coincidence that the last name Quinn rhymes with Finn, for if Robbie unwittingly borrowed from any quirky screwball actress in this film, it was from Madonna (who in turn borrowed from the likes of Carole Lombard, Jean Harlow and Marilyn Monroe). And while Harley Quinn might have come along long before Nikki Finn in comic book form, it is Margot Robbie’s post-Nikki interpretation of the character that will be heretofore crystallized in people’s minds. Botched New York accent aside, the majority of the film was shot in Downtown Los Angeles (because New York really blows too hard to even bother for the “authenticity” of filming there). Like Madonna herself and Nikki Finn, Harley might pretend she prefers walking alone to having an accomplice, yet, in the end, both women succumb to the comfort of someone who, for the first time, “gets” them. In Harley’s case, it’s rendered more modern by being a companion of a platonic variety. And by the way, your group of friends has nothing on this mercenary girl gang. 

Alas, Birds of Prey makes kitsch work for it in a way that Who’s That Girl, (which has camp value in the present only unintentionally and with retrospect) never could. Case in point is a now reinvigorated with new iconicness scene of Harley on her own macabre set of Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (Marilyn forever an influence on pop culture, and with this scene also having been repurposed for the “Material Girl” video two years before Who’s That Girl’s release). After being knocked around by Roman while tied to a chair and told she talks too much (especially for a girl, obviously), she hallucinates a scene of herself in a machine gun-fraught version of the illustrious number. And instead of a pink gown, she’s wearing a pink pantsuit. The ultimate unspoken emblem of a boss bitch. Yes, we’ve come a long way, baby. But there’s still miles to go before we sleep. Luckily, Harley has access to cocaine.