Happy New Year!
I've done a terrible job catching up on 2019 movies. Last month I saw Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker as expected, and it was more enjoyable than expected though still messily made. (Read my review here!)
Then we went to see Richard Jewell and I'm real glad we did. It wasn't trying to be overly artistic, but just to tell the story truthfully, and it comes across beautifully. I haven't reviewed it yet, but I will. I'm saying that I will right here so that I will have to.
I also watched The Aeronauts off Amazon Prime. It wasn't good, but I gave it a chance. Maybe I should review that too, so I can explain the bizarre way in which it is bad. No promises though.
There's still so many I want to see before I make up any king of top movies of 2019 list. Little Women is on the schedule, as is 1917. But now the January movies are coming! And I kinda like January movies. They reset my love for film by being dumb and enjoyable.
What are you looking forward to seeing in 2020 -- January and beyond?
1917
Wide release Jan 10th; R
I'm still counting this as a 2019 release since it had a limited release over Christmas. But I haven't seen it yet, and thought I would point out that the wide release is on its way. Since it my most-anticipated film of 2019, I don't mind having to wait until 2020 to see it. Or at least... I can wait. I have tickets. I'll probably make it. I HAVE to make it!
The Informer
In theaters Jan 10th; NR
Starting the year off right -- this is EXACTLY the kind of movie that should get released in January, and the kind of movie I'm ready to see. That obviously not Oscar-quality deal, that promises you won't have to use your brain much to enjoy it. Maybe it'll be genuinely bad, but to me it looks like a simple action thriller, cliched but not in an annoying or necessarily bad way, starring capable actors. I'll totally watch this.
Just Mercy
In theaters Jan 10th; PG-13
Time to get political (sorry) but this is interesting. This is a true story about a lawyer who works to right and injustice -- very similar to the plot of Richard Jewell. But watching the trailer for this, most of what I see is preaching about the agenda the film wants to push. Maybe it's less the case in the actual movie, but the reason Jewell worked so well was it just told the story plainly, without inserting it's own political ideas into the script. I think its best when political movies don't have political messages. Especially true stories should tell the truth and let the audience take away what they see. But I guess we'll see about this one. It does have a good cast of Michael B. Jordan, Jamie Foxx, Brie Larson, Tim Blake Nelson and Rafe Spall.
Underwater
In theaters Jan 10th; PG-13
Another ideal January release. Deep ocean movies are essentially lost in space movies but with the extra detail of water instead of the vacuum of space, and this flick knows it. It's Alien under the sea, and I'm ready to go watch it right now. It looks like a lot of fun, and has a nice big cast of names to kill off, with Kristen Stewart in the lead. Movies like this are film essentials. I hope it tires hard to entertain and doesn't take itself too seriously. If it weren't for movies like this I would get tired of loving film altogether.
Inherit the Viper
Limited release and streaming Jan 10th; R
Hard to tell with this one. It looks like it's very self-serious but also not particular in any way. Rednecks and drugs and violence starter pack. Family dramas don't need exceptional plots to be great, but this one seems focused more on plot than character. If I had to venture a guess, it'd be that the movie's too safe and unremarkable to be truly great, but maybe it's well made and acted enough to make it worth watching.
Bad Boys for Life
In theaters Jan 17th; NR
I have seen Bad Boys 2... but not Bad Boys. And that should clue you in to the level of care I have for the franchise. A new sequel might inspire me to see the first one and the second again perhaps -- especially if this is any good. Honestly though, I doubt it will be. It's been too long, and more importantly, no Michael Bay in the director's chair. You might think that's a good thing, but the directors are intentionally mimicking Bay's style, and, love him or hate him or anything in between we can all agree on one thing: No one can do Michael Bay but Michael Bay. (Language warning for the trailer.)
Dolittle
In theaters Jan 17th; PG
This movie has a pretty good cast... of voice actors and one or two people whose face we'll see. It's a lot to ask of the people who are clamoring for Robert Downey Jr. to will an Oscar for his performance in Avengers: Endgame. Because it's up to them and them alone to buy the tickets so it won't bomb. Just kidding, I'm sure nostalgia will drag in some unsuspecting patrons. They're scraping the bottom of the barrel with CGI reboots, and you can tell from this trailer that tried to look epic and get you on emotion instead of the promise of a good film. I won't be surprised if people say it's good, but I would be very surprised if it actually is.
The Wave
Limited release and streaming Jan 17th; R
Justin Long indie scifi drug trip? I dunno, but it looks like the sort of movie that I won't be able to put aside until I've seen it and understand what it's about and what it's trying to do. Looks very low-budget, but that can breed creativity and it certainly has a unique sense to it.
The Turning
In theaters Jan 24th; PG-13
Finn Wolfhard has been the scared person in enough horror movies now and is leveling up to being the scary person. I look forward to bearing witness. With the lights on. Preferably during the day. That's all.
The Gentlemen
In theaters Jan 24th; R
Well this has Guy Ritchie written all over it -- and that's nothing but a good thing in my opinion! My favorite of his work to date is RocknRolla, and this one looks much more like that than Sherlock Holmes (which the trailer wants you to remember) or Arthur: Legend of the Sword (which it doesn't want you to remember). Ritchie returning to his roots maybe? Also quite the cast. Charlie Hunnam leading (who I like now) with Matthew McConaughey (who I still don't like very much) and Michelle Dockery, Henry Golding, Colin Farrell, and Hugh Grant (all of whom I definitely like). This is the sort of movie that I won't trust the critic reviews on, and will certainly have to see for myself.
The Rhythm Section
In theaters Jan 31st; NR
First of all I legit thought this was a sad music drama or something based on the poster. Second, Blake Lively is trying to be taken seriously as an action star now, apparently. Looks like she's channeling Jason Bourne here. The plot isn't like Bourne, I'm just getting that vibe. A stylistic knockoff of an irrelevant franchise doesn't sound promising, but if I don't forget it exists I'll consider watching it if it can tempt me with good reviews.
Showing posts with label Michael B. Jordan. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Michael B. Jordan. Show all posts
Thursday, January 2, 2020
Sunday, February 18, 2018
Black Panther
Spoilers!
After a stellar introduction in Civil War, Chadwick Boseman gets his time in the spotlight as T'Challa, the king of the secretive country of Wakanda, and the legendary Black Panther. But his solo outing is a character downgrade from his brief but compelling turn in the Captain America movie.
I guess the Russo Brothers are to blame. They did too good a job giving T'Challa an outstanding arc, and developing him into a king worthy of his throne. And where do you go from there? Well the movie backtracks a bit, deciding that he's not officially king yet, and the way Wakanda works is basically any Wakandan can challenge his kingship. They do battle, and the winner gets to be king. (Yes, Wakanda is meant to be an advanced civilization hundreds of years ahead of the rest of the world, and yes, whoever is physically strongest gets to be king.)
So T'Challa is challenged, and he wins. Alright, he's king. Then suddenly it's a James Bond movie and T'Challa's upbeat and charming sister Shuri (Letitia Wright) is Q, the tech girl. She outfits the confirmed Black Panther, and he goes out with his love interest Nakia (the incredibly gorgeous Lupita Nyong'o) and his bodyguard Okoye (Danai Gurira) to capture Klaue (Andy Serkis) who just popped up on their radar. But Agent Ross (Martin Freeman) is also there and also wants Klaue. After a pretty cool chase scene T'Challa gets him, but instead of blowing the joint with the prize, he hands Klaue over to Ross, and inevitably, he escapes.
Then the real bad guy Erik Killmonger (Michael B. Jordan) starts his play, and the movie transitions into the plot of The Lion King. Erik is a citizen of Wakanda, the son of T'Challa's uncle, who was killed by T'Challa's father when he turned bad and tried to kill Forest Whitaker. They left Erik behind to grow up American, so now he wants revenge and to be king to prevent other children from having to grow up as he did. He's also stronger than T'Challa. So he challenges, T'Challa accepts because that's what's done -- though he knows who he is and what his intentions are -- and he loses the fight, and gets thrown over a cliff to his apparent death.
Everyone's devastated but they can't do anything about it -- Killmonger is now king fair and square, and no one does anything about it because this is an advanced civilization, and the tradition of kingship revered and respected. Nah, forget that. The Queen Mother (Angela Bassett), Nakia, Shuri, and Ross steal a magic flower that gives the Black Panther powers, and take it to the guy who challenged T'Challa at the beginning of the movie, hoping that he will use the power to overthrow their rightful king. But surprise! T'Challa is there! Some fishermen pulled him out of the river, and he's in a coma but alive. They give him the flower, he gets his power back, they go do battle, he defeats Erik, the end.
Cool, so -- what's the problem with this? Look at all the choices T'Challa makes. He accepts all challenges to his throne; to save face he doesn't keep Klaue for himself; he's unconscious for the entire portion of his "exile," and then he's saved by other characters. His character isn't changed when he fights Killmonger the second time, but somehow he still beats him. Basically, he's a doormat, and spends the whole movie being upstaged by more interesting characters. He does skirt round the issue of whether Wakanda should share their technology with the rest of the world, and finally decides that they should, but I was never convinced of his belief in the argument against it. So that message comes across, but it doesn't do much for the character.
Now, I don't have anything against a movie plotting itself after The Lion King. I like The Lion King. The problem I have is that the plot plays out in a way that diminishes the lead character instead of highlighting him as it should. I keep thinking that only if we had followed him over that cliff and if he had been forced to survive, empower himself, and return, all on his own volition, then he would have been so much more compelling. Also, other characters blame him for mistakes that are debatably not his fault, but if he ever blames himself for anything, we never get to know. He never has an inner struggle with himself. This method of character development is extremely ineffective and lazy to me.
Practically all the other characters are more compelling than T'Challa, which is as amazing as it is sad, but I'm just going to talk about Erik. See, we feel for him because he was abandoned to a hard life, but he did still murder... well, at least one person. And he wasn't a very nice king. But he's sympathetic, so when he's dying and T'Challa has the technology to save him, he declares that he wants to die, and T'Challa lets him. In order for T'Challa to show strength in that scene he would have saved him no matter what he wanted, but he made an understandable choice because it was compassionate and we feel for Erik. But as a result, the scene -- the movie's most powerfully effective -- serves Erik, not T'Challa. Scene by scene, throughout the film, T'Challa always comes out the least developed, least characterized character.
It seems like the worst criticism you can possibly give this movie is that it's an average Marvel movie, but unfortunately, that's what it is. Wakanda is a visually unusual place with a neat culture, and there are some great design elements, but that's just frosting; something with which every Marvel film differs. The cake underneath is still the same Marvel-flavored production-line vanilla. The CGI is passable if you don't look too close. Action sequences are typical with one or two memorable moments each. Black Panther lacks any distinct fighting style, and doesn't even run fast in the entire movie. Again, Civil War set the bar too high with action sequences that required an amount of effort this film wasn't willing to put in.
The dialogue is uninspired. Brought back from the dead, all T'Challa can think to say is "Can I have a blanket?" There are a few solid jokes and I especially liked Shuri's sharp, lighthearted bantering attitude. But, there are at least two dramatic/powerful moments that are ruined by inserting mood-killing dumb jokes. Worst was when a rhino licks Okoye's face. That isn't even funny, and it killed the coolness of that moment for her. Whoever decided that that these moments of bathos should be the Marvel standard of hilarious needs to wake up and smell the audience disengaging from the scene. It works as in-the-moment entertainment every time, but keeps any kind of emotion from having staying power beyond five seconds.
Black Panther has its entertaining times as it strolls along in a predictable direction. It gets its themes across with admirable subtlety, and boasts a memorable and talented cast. It goes through the motions of ups and downs with fight scenes in the correct places, drama in the correct places, jokes in the "correct" places. It's got cool tech that's convenient to the plot, and world-building that does a fantastic job distracting from a surprisingly lackluster style. There's nothing really wrong with it, except that it's not at all exceptional, as it claims to be. It's average. This is exactly what Marvel is now; well-manufactured, generic entertainment.
Sometimes I wonder if I'm crazy or heartless, when I don't love well-loved movies like this, but then I watch a film that does engage me, and the quality difference is clear. For whoever this movie does work for, I say good on you; relish it. As for me, I'm not disappointed, and I'm not impressed. I was hoping T'Challa's previously established character of quiet, powerful authority and sleek fighting techniques could be recreated for his solo rein, but the result falls short. Just another competently entertaining superhero blockbuster, Black Panther fits in perfectly with its Marvel peers, exploring another new corner of the broad universe; but has left me about as indifferent as a hunk of Vibranium.
After a stellar introduction in Civil War, Chadwick Boseman gets his time in the spotlight as T'Challa, the king of the secretive country of Wakanda, and the legendary Black Panther. But his solo outing is a character downgrade from his brief but compelling turn in the Captain America movie.
 |
| Maybe I'm just tired of Marvel movies. I mean, I am tired of Marvel movies. But I don't think that's the only problem here. |
I guess the Russo Brothers are to blame. They did too good a job giving T'Challa an outstanding arc, and developing him into a king worthy of his throne. And where do you go from there? Well the movie backtracks a bit, deciding that he's not officially king yet, and the way Wakanda works is basically any Wakandan can challenge his kingship. They do battle, and the winner gets to be king. (Yes, Wakanda is meant to be an advanced civilization hundreds of years ahead of the rest of the world, and yes, whoever is physically strongest gets to be king.)
So T'Challa is challenged, and he wins. Alright, he's king. Then suddenly it's a James Bond movie and T'Challa's upbeat and charming sister Shuri (Letitia Wright) is Q, the tech girl. She outfits the confirmed Black Panther, and he goes out with his love interest Nakia (the incredibly gorgeous Lupita Nyong'o) and his bodyguard Okoye (Danai Gurira) to capture Klaue (Andy Serkis) who just popped up on their radar. But Agent Ross (Martin Freeman) is also there and also wants Klaue. After a pretty cool chase scene T'Challa gets him, but instead of blowing the joint with the prize, he hands Klaue over to Ross, and inevitably, he escapes.
 |
| Obviously this is from the 007 portion of the film. |
Then the real bad guy Erik Killmonger (Michael B. Jordan) starts his play, and the movie transitions into the plot of The Lion King. Erik is a citizen of Wakanda, the son of T'Challa's uncle, who was killed by T'Challa's father when he turned bad and tried to kill Forest Whitaker. They left Erik behind to grow up American, so now he wants revenge and to be king to prevent other children from having to grow up as he did. He's also stronger than T'Challa. So he challenges, T'Challa accepts because that's what's done -- though he knows who he is and what his intentions are -- and he loses the fight, and gets thrown over a cliff to his apparent death.
Everyone's devastated but they can't do anything about it -- Killmonger is now king fair and square, and no one does anything about it because this is an advanced civilization, and the tradition of kingship revered and respected. Nah, forget that. The Queen Mother (Angela Bassett), Nakia, Shuri, and Ross steal a magic flower that gives the Black Panther powers, and take it to the guy who challenged T'Challa at the beginning of the movie, hoping that he will use the power to overthrow their rightful king. But surprise! T'Challa is there! Some fishermen pulled him out of the river, and he's in a coma but alive. They give him the flower, he gets his power back, they go do battle, he defeats Erik, the end.
 |
| Thus Erik is decidedly more compelling than T'Challa. So good for him, but I kinda wanted the film's hero to be compelling too, or else why would we care if he wins? |
Cool, so -- what's the problem with this? Look at all the choices T'Challa makes. He accepts all challenges to his throne; to save face he doesn't keep Klaue for himself; he's unconscious for the entire portion of his "exile," and then he's saved by other characters. His character isn't changed when he fights Killmonger the second time, but somehow he still beats him. Basically, he's a doormat, and spends the whole movie being upstaged by more interesting characters. He does skirt round the issue of whether Wakanda should share their technology with the rest of the world, and finally decides that they should, but I was never convinced of his belief in the argument against it. So that message comes across, but it doesn't do much for the character.
Now, I don't have anything against a movie plotting itself after The Lion King. I like The Lion King. The problem I have is that the plot plays out in a way that diminishes the lead character instead of highlighting him as it should. I keep thinking that only if we had followed him over that cliff and if he had been forced to survive, empower himself, and return, all on his own volition, then he would have been so much more compelling. Also, other characters blame him for mistakes that are debatably not his fault, but if he ever blames himself for anything, we never get to know. He never has an inner struggle with himself. This method of character development is extremely ineffective and lazy to me.
 |
| SIIIIMBAAA. REMEMBER WHO YOU AAARE. |
Practically all the other characters are more compelling than T'Challa, which is as amazing as it is sad, but I'm just going to talk about Erik. See, we feel for him because he was abandoned to a hard life, but he did still murder... well, at least one person. And he wasn't a very nice king. But he's sympathetic, so when he's dying and T'Challa has the technology to save him, he declares that he wants to die, and T'Challa lets him. In order for T'Challa to show strength in that scene he would have saved him no matter what he wanted, but he made an understandable choice because it was compassionate and we feel for Erik. But as a result, the scene -- the movie's most powerfully effective -- serves Erik, not T'Challa. Scene by scene, throughout the film, T'Challa always comes out the least developed, least characterized character.
It seems like the worst criticism you can possibly give this movie is that it's an average Marvel movie, but unfortunately, that's what it is. Wakanda is a visually unusual place with a neat culture, and there are some great design elements, but that's just frosting; something with which every Marvel film differs. The cake underneath is still the same Marvel-flavored production-line vanilla. The CGI is passable if you don't look too close. Action sequences are typical with one or two memorable moments each. Black Panther lacks any distinct fighting style, and doesn't even run fast in the entire movie. Again, Civil War set the bar too high with action sequences that required an amount of effort this film wasn't willing to put in.
 |
| Fight scenes in water are automatically cool. Better choreography and filming could have made it amazing. |
The dialogue is uninspired. Brought back from the dead, all T'Challa can think to say is "Can I have a blanket?" There are a few solid jokes and I especially liked Shuri's sharp, lighthearted bantering attitude. But, there are at least two dramatic/powerful moments that are ruined by inserting mood-killing dumb jokes. Worst was when a rhino licks Okoye's face. That isn't even funny, and it killed the coolness of that moment for her. Whoever decided that that these moments of bathos should be the Marvel standard of hilarious needs to wake up and smell the audience disengaging from the scene. It works as in-the-moment entertainment every time, but keeps any kind of emotion from having staying power beyond five seconds.
Black Panther has its entertaining times as it strolls along in a predictable direction. It gets its themes across with admirable subtlety, and boasts a memorable and talented cast. It goes through the motions of ups and downs with fight scenes in the correct places, drama in the correct places, jokes in the "correct" places. It's got cool tech that's convenient to the plot, and world-building that does a fantastic job distracting from a surprisingly lackluster style. There's nothing really wrong with it, except that it's not at all exceptional, as it claims to be. It's average. This is exactly what Marvel is now; well-manufactured, generic entertainment.
 |
| I really don't hate this film at all. I'm just bored of Marvel's movie-by-committee shenanigans. |
Sometimes I wonder if I'm crazy or heartless, when I don't love well-loved movies like this, but then I watch a film that does engage me, and the quality difference is clear. For whoever this movie does work for, I say good on you; relish it. As for me, I'm not disappointed, and I'm not impressed. I was hoping T'Challa's previously established character of quiet, powerful authority and sleek fighting techniques could be recreated for his solo rein, but the result falls short. Just another competently entertaining superhero blockbuster, Black Panther fits in perfectly with its Marvel peers, exploring another new corner of the broad universe; but has left me about as indifferent as a hunk of Vibranium.
Thursday, April 28, 2016
Fantastic Four
Some Spoilers.
I completely understand everyone else who has seen this movie now. If I had seen it with the expectation that the trailer gave me instead of the expectation I got later after seeing the Rotten Tomatoes score, I would have been mad too.
I while ago I watched a conspiracy theory video that humorously suggested the idea that all Fantastic Four movies are actually satires of what superhero movie of their day are; purposefully being terrible films to point out flaws and pitfalls, thus setting the movie world back in order. Like a League of Shadows in film form. I thought it was a neat idea, but probably untrue. Until I saw Fant4stic. Now I'm not so sure, because if this movie was trying to fully be all the worst things you can see in a superhero movie today in order to satirize it, it couldn't have done a better job.
First off, it's very cookie-cutter in form. Starting with backstory -- kid genius Reed Richards (Miles Teller) builds a transporter to an unknown location, and when he figures out how to reverse the transport, Dr. Storm (Reg E. Cathey) recruits him to his lab where he's been working unsuccessfully on the same project. Then they "build the team" (and the transporter) using typical and cliched methods. There's Sue (Kate Mara) Dr. Storm's adopted daughter, Johnny (Michael B. Jordan) his careless, out of control son. Victor Von Doom (Toby Kebbell) is a sullen, cynical outcast type. And of course there's Reed's childhood friend Ben Grimm (Jamie Bell) who supported Reed's dream though his years as a laughing stock, and therefore couldn't be left out of his moment of success.
Then once they're all together, stupidity happens! The transporter works, and the bad guy (the two-act bad guy who fills in for Doom until he's ready that is) (Tim Blake Nelson) wants to get NASA involved to send people through to explore the whole new world on the other side. And he's totally right to want this. It's literally a new, unknown world there, you would need to send through people who are trained for every imaginable eventuality and disciplined to be cautious and cool-headed. You would not want to send a bunch of big-headed nerds whose brains are too filled with genius to be bothered with trivial things like common sense. Perfectly, the only not smart person there, Ben, is the only one with any common sense or caution, but of course his wisdom is ignored and the trip ends with disaster and the gaining of superpowers. Yay!
This is about halfway through the movie now, because, as you know, if you want to make a serious superhero movie you have to have lots of setup and wait as long as possible to reveal the comic-book-y stuff. And here, the comic-book-y stuff is where it gets really disappointing. The CGI is the worst thing ever. The Thing looks pretty good -- generally realistic, but the design is a little dopey with the human eyes -- but Mr. Fantastic's stretchiness is so bad that it's almost not even funny. Almost. The effects elsewhere are randomly spotty. Also Sue's Glinda-bubble is way too silly and way too reminiscent of The Wizard of Oz to belong in such a straight-faced movie. (Unless of course, the straight face is a facade...)
Let's talk about character. To get them out of the way, Sue is dull as expected; Johnny is charmless though he's mean to be charming. Comic relief from him (and elsewhere) is written painfully bad and is only a relief when it's over. Doom is trite, and then boring, and lacks anything compelling. Reed was confusing. I kept watching him, thinking "Miles Teller isn't a bad actor. He's not even acting badly. He can brighten up a Divergent movie for goodness sake! Why is this so bad?" It was a clash of the actor's talent and the script's extreme terribleness, and I'm pretty sure Teller handled it as well as can be expected, but the script still won.
I really want to talk about Ben. No exaggeration, the two or three minutes where Jamie Bell's face was on screen where the only times this film showed even a spark of liveliness. He actually used facial expressions and didn't have to battle with the script too much. In fact, the script served him a little by giving him some interesting character development, where he feels left behind when Reed leaves, yet once he joins him, he feels out of place and out of depth. This almost goes in a good direction after the superpowers come, because as we all know, Ben's powers are the biggest burden. Literally. And we really feel for him when he's abandoned by Reed, especially after he himself was such a good, encouraging friend. But later this conflict that could be compelling turns into a petty squabble, before being resolved by -- wait for it -- absolutely nothing, for one final disappointing slap to the face.
The movie ends so lazily, with the four coming up with their team name in the most painfully contrived way conceivable. ("Fantastic Four" is such an obvious name -- none of those geniuses could think of it off the top of their head? They had to do a whole bit? Really?) It also ends at the exact spot where it seems like if it had continued it might have actually gotten better from there, but instead leaves with the promise of sequel that we know will never happen which is sad in so many ways.
Coming back to the conspiracy, I have to mention that while this movie was very bad in almost every aspect, it truly felt as though it was exactly what it meant to be. The writing was cliched and horrendous, but in a practiced, even professional way. And the movie was unbearably dull and lifeless, but was unapologetic and confident about it. There was nothing worthwhile in the whole film except one minute of Jamie Bell's screen time, and the film's strange, unjustified sense of confidence. Watching it as a satire and thinking that maybe the terribleness was done purposefully helped me enjoy way more than I possibly could have otherwise, but the fact remains: Bad movies are bad movies. And Fant4stic... it's bad.
I completely understand everyone else who has seen this movie now. If I had seen it with the expectation that the trailer gave me instead of the expectation I got later after seeing the Rotten Tomatoes score, I would have been mad too.
 |
| As they say in the movies: It's clobberin' time! |
I while ago I watched a conspiracy theory video that humorously suggested the idea that all Fantastic Four movies are actually satires of what superhero movie of their day are; purposefully being terrible films to point out flaws and pitfalls, thus setting the movie world back in order. Like a League of Shadows in film form. I thought it was a neat idea, but probably untrue. Until I saw Fant4stic. Now I'm not so sure, because if this movie was trying to fully be all the worst things you can see in a superhero movie today in order to satirize it, it couldn't have done a better job.
First off, it's very cookie-cutter in form. Starting with backstory -- kid genius Reed Richards (Miles Teller) builds a transporter to an unknown location, and when he figures out how to reverse the transport, Dr. Storm (Reg E. Cathey) recruits him to his lab where he's been working unsuccessfully on the same project. Then they "build the team" (and the transporter) using typical and cliched methods. There's Sue (Kate Mara) Dr. Storm's adopted daughter, Johnny (Michael B. Jordan) his careless, out of control son. Victor Von Doom (Toby Kebbell) is a sullen, cynical outcast type. And of course there's Reed's childhood friend Ben Grimm (Jamie Bell) who supported Reed's dream though his years as a laughing stock, and therefore couldn't be left out of his moment of success.
 |
| Miles Teller, please stop being in terrible movies. |
Then once they're all together, stupidity happens! The transporter works, and the bad guy (the two-act bad guy who fills in for Doom until he's ready that is) (Tim Blake Nelson) wants to get NASA involved to send people through to explore the whole new world on the other side. And he's totally right to want this. It's literally a new, unknown world there, you would need to send through people who are trained for every imaginable eventuality and disciplined to be cautious and cool-headed. You would not want to send a bunch of big-headed nerds whose brains are too filled with genius to be bothered with trivial things like common sense. Perfectly, the only not smart person there, Ben, is the only one with any common sense or caution, but of course his wisdom is ignored and the trip ends with disaster and the gaining of superpowers. Yay!
This is about halfway through the movie now, because, as you know, if you want to make a serious superhero movie you have to have lots of setup and wait as long as possible to reveal the comic-book-y stuff. And here, the comic-book-y stuff is where it gets really disappointing. The CGI is the worst thing ever. The Thing looks pretty good -- generally realistic, but the design is a little dopey with the human eyes -- but Mr. Fantastic's stretchiness is so bad that it's almost not even funny. Almost. The effects elsewhere are randomly spotty. Also Sue's Glinda-bubble is way too silly and way too reminiscent of The Wizard of Oz to belong in such a straight-faced movie. (Unless of course, the straight face is a facade...)
 |
| Convenient that I can't find photos of any of this silly stuff... isn't it? |
Let's talk about character. To get them out of the way, Sue is dull as expected; Johnny is charmless though he's mean to be charming. Comic relief from him (and elsewhere) is written painfully bad and is only a relief when it's over. Doom is trite, and then boring, and lacks anything compelling. Reed was confusing. I kept watching him, thinking "Miles Teller isn't a bad actor. He's not even acting badly. He can brighten up a Divergent movie for goodness sake! Why is this so bad?" It was a clash of the actor's talent and the script's extreme terribleness, and I'm pretty sure Teller handled it as well as can be expected, but the script still won.
I really want to talk about Ben. No exaggeration, the two or three minutes where Jamie Bell's face was on screen where the only times this film showed even a spark of liveliness. He actually used facial expressions and didn't have to battle with the script too much. In fact, the script served him a little by giving him some interesting character development, where he feels left behind when Reed leaves, yet once he joins him, he feels out of place and out of depth. This almost goes in a good direction after the superpowers come, because as we all know, Ben's powers are the biggest burden. Literally. And we really feel for him when he's abandoned by Reed, especially after he himself was such a good, encouraging friend. But later this conflict that could be compelling turns into a petty squabble, before being resolved by -- wait for it -- absolutely nothing, for one final disappointing slap to the face.
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| As The Thing his voice is heavily edited as well. It was like he just disappeared from the movie. |
The movie ends so lazily, with the four coming up with their team name in the most painfully contrived way conceivable. ("Fantastic Four" is such an obvious name -- none of those geniuses could think of it off the top of their head? They had to do a whole bit? Really?) It also ends at the exact spot where it seems like if it had continued it might have actually gotten better from there, but instead leaves with the promise of sequel that we know will never happen which is sad in so many ways.
Coming back to the conspiracy, I have to mention that while this movie was very bad in almost every aspect, it truly felt as though it was exactly what it meant to be. The writing was cliched and horrendous, but in a practiced, even professional way. And the movie was unbearably dull and lifeless, but was unapologetic and confident about it. There was nothing worthwhile in the whole film except one minute of Jamie Bell's screen time, and the film's strange, unjustified sense of confidence. Watching it as a satire and thinking that maybe the terribleness was done purposefully helped me enjoy way more than I possibly could have otherwise, but the fact remains: Bad movies are bad movies. And Fant4stic... it's bad.
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