HAYWIRE (R) Because of the holiday deadline, this week's Movie Pick focuses on a DVD/Blu-ray recommendation instead of a first-run release. Normal programming will resume next issue.

Steven Soderbergh's super-lean action movie Haywire was released earlier this year but left theaters quickly. It deserved better. Mallory (Gina Carano) works for a private security firm run by her ex-boyfriend Kenneth (Ewan McGregor). The government covertly uses the firm to do dirty jobs around the world. Mallory is sent to Barcelona, ostensibly to rescue a kidnapped Chinese journalist. She teams up with a new guy, Aaron (Channing Tatum), and they complete the job. But while working on another assignment in Dublin with a British agent (Michael Fassbender), things go awry. Bones break, heads roll and Mallory goes rogue.

The American action movie has been on suicide watch for some time. Most studio product is top-heavy with backstory, overstuffed with visually incomprehensible action scenes relying on jump cuts rather than fluid fight choreography to jolt. The fun component has been taken out of the entertainment formula, replaced with narrative bombast and technological bullying. But the most egregious cinematic sin is that true physicality, the meat and blood and pulse that is the foundation of any decent action sequence, has been replaced with pixels and posing. The American action movie is dying, and I miss it so.

With Haywire, Soderbergh and screenwriter Lem Dobbs (they previously collaborated on the rarely seen Kafka and the underrated revenge picture The Limey) valiantly resurrect the modern-day action movie in its gritty 1970s incarnation. It's also spiced with a dash of Hong Kong 1980s-styled "heroic bloodshed" and given a strong blast of Bronson at his bone-crunching best. The big difference from other Hollywood action movies, however, is that like the legendary Jackie Chan or Tony Jaa, Carano, a mixed martial arts fighter, performs her own stunts. She has limited dramatic range, but she's equipped with enough low-wattage charisma to keep things interesting between fights. Dobbs' script prods with some feminist subtext—the movie's tagline is "They Left Her No Choice!"—as Carano pummels her way through the men who've done her wrong.

The best thing, though, is the action. The stationary camera captures every snap, crunch and gouge, treating Carano's brutal grace with respect, much like Astaire's fleet-footed genius was once filmed. Some of Soderbergh’s best work has been in the crime genre, and Haywire is no exception.