This is a genre thriller boiled down to its brutal essentials, devoted to a naturalistic feel and layered in such a way that we’re kept off balance, thrown into the middle of the fight.

Directed by the great Steven Soderbergh (whose uber-creepy germ drama "Contagion" made my top 10 films of 2011), "Haywire" is defiant in its refusal to telegraph its intentions. It is the anti-"Mission: Impossible," and absolutely electrifying.

Much like Soderbergh’s "Ocean’s Eleven," it’s the atmospherics and the choreography of the big mission that distinguishes "Haywire." Yes, there is a rushed back story told via rapid flashback, but as the death count adds up it quickly becomes apparent that the names and the motives of all these people don’t really matter all that much.

This is a cat-and-mouse thriller, in which various covert operatives try to kill black ops superstar Mallory Kane (Gina Carano), only to find that she is always one step ahead of them. From an Irish farmhouse to a Dublin city raid, a New York car chase and a western home invasion, "Haywire" is a tour de force of action set pieces that make use of both smarts and strength.

We meet Mallory as she sits at a rural American diner. She’s not eating, not moving - just monitoring the movements of those around her, waiting to pounce. When a car pulls into the parking lot, she’s expecting to see Kenneth (Ewan McGregor), her employer. He runs a private firm that is hired by the U.S. government to do its dirty work, and he’s put Mallory on his staff because she is a lethal weapon, and the kind of woman who can make someone disappear. But a job went bust in Barcelona and now she’s convinced that he double-crossed her.

When a different man on her team arrives to talk to her, telling Mallory that Kenneth couldn’t make it, she knows that a bounty has been placed on her head. She beats him to a pulp, kidnaps another diner customer and takes to the highway in his car. She relays her tale to him, and we see through his eyes.

If most thrillers are about the labyrinth of the plot, "Haywire" is instead about the thrill of the confrontation. We rush through exposition to arrive at the showdown. And given that Carano is a mixed martial arts professional fighter, there is a raw physicality to these showdowns that is jaw- dropping to behold.

There are few (if any) special effects here. Instead, it’s fast and furious choreography, a merciless eruption of kinetic energy that may point to the beginning of a whole new genre, where it’s less about procedurals or A-list personalities than sheer physical prowess.

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