Zoe Saldana Defends "Colombiana"

The American born actress Zoe Saldana of Dominican and Puerto Rican decent is the new "Colombiana." However, the titled has angered some Colombians, for lacking any sort of Colombian substance. Saldana plays a young woman who has grown up to be an assassin after witnessing the murder of her parents as a child in Bogota. She then escapes the country and most of the rest of the movie takes place in Chicago. 

While some argue the plot stereotypically targets a drug theme Colombia has been trying to get away from, Saldana argues the main story has little to no tie in to Colombia as a country. 

"In every part of the world you will find good guys and you'll find bad guys that are looking to harm innocent people," said Saldana. 

"This time he just wanted it to be Colombia. Had he had the same affinity with the Dominican Republic, or Mexico it would have been called 'Mexico.' I understand the apprehension but I am here to ease my Colombian brothers and sisters to please go see it. She turns out to be this dark heroin that just wants to rid the world of bad guys and you should feel proud about that." 

The action movie keeps a fast pace from beginning to end. 

Saldana said when she read the script, her character was so strong it seduced her. 

"I play a character called Cataleya Restrepo and she was born in Colombia and at a very young age when she was nine she witnesses a very catastrophic event happen to her where something very valuable was taken from her and that sort of changes the rest of her life," said Saldana. 

Preparing physically for the role was a challenging task. Because her character was trained by her uncle who was a thug, her actual training had to be less graceful, more animal and volatile. 

"It was observing animal behavior in order for me to know how physically she moves because she steps into different characters in order for her to segway into these places, that's how she conquers and gets her targets, " says Saldana. 

"It was a lot of training, krav maga mixed with like Martial Arts and I worked with an amazing stunt coordinator that basically was the one that did all the fights for the movie. His name is Alain Figlarz and he trained Matt Damon for 'The Bourne Identity.' This was the kind of fighting that they wanted to have in this movie." 

Stepping into the shoes of an assassin required lots of research on Saldana's part. 

"I read 'The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo,' in order to psychologically dive in and see how a person like that feels and how they make that switch thinking, 'Well I have now become a superhero,'" said Saldana. "Where I need to rid the world of all bad and save innocent people. That's like the nine year old that is still trapped inside Cataleya's mind that she is going to become this warrior and kill all these bad guys and in hopes one day she will wake up and she'll feel differently about what happened to her, and that is never the case." 

"Colombiana," in theaters on August 26, 2011.


Source: AP