Green Lantern
Let me just cut to the chase here. Green Lantern was just flat out bad. My favorite cliche to bludgeon my staff at work with is: "you win some, you lose some and right now we're [depending on the circumstance] winning/losing". Green Lantern lost. It was boring. I'm pretty sure a 13-year old with absolutely NO imagination came up with the plot. It looked AWFUL... awful. It was hard to believe how awful it looked. Granted, I saw it in 3D which meant I was saddled with three dimensions of crap; it seemed to magnify how cheesy the special effects looked. (3D is a tired money-grabbing gimmick anyway. The only movie I've ever seen that was enhanced by 3D was Avatar. For anything else it has come off as pointless, hokey, and in far too many instances headache-inducing). Back to taking the proverbial 2x4 to Green Lantern....
The tone of the movie was way, way off. The thing that made Thor so much fun was that the filmmakers didn't take the film too seriously. Martin Campbell should have stolen a page from Sir Kenneth Branagh and company for his Lantern movie. (Wait has Kenneth Branagh been knighted? Actually I think he turned it down... anyway, still, we'll stick with it for now). The movie came off as overly moralistic and preachy and far too often it played out like an after school special or PSA supporting self confidence and the virtues of "good". Yuck. No thanks.
You know what? Let me bounce back to that plot. I typically try hard not to give away much but I'd like to highlight a few of the more rudimentary points in the story. The movie opens by giving the audience a quick overview of the whole Green Lantern universe. The power of will versus the power of fear. Ok, sure, back story could be helpful. Then it sets up the introduction of this story's villain by detailing how one of the most noble Lantern-bearers (there are actually a shitload of Green Lanterns in the universe...Ryan Reynolds' Hal Jordan is just one) beat this evil being down and trapped him on some forbidden planet. He did a horrible job apparently because the thing escapes with less difficulty than it takes me to get out of a button-down shirt. And while I may not be good at much, I can take button-down shirts off like a damn champ. Anyway. So the bad...creature escapes and the shit hits the fan. All of the sudden- it would seem- this thing is unbeatable. All the supposed fearless Lanterns don't want to have anything to do with it. Well... I suppose I shouldn't say too much more... orrrrrr.... (SPOILER ALERT: even though some of the best Lanterns get killed by this thing, and the current best Lantern -who took over when the Lantern that originally trapped the thing was killed by it- want nothing to do with it- to the point where in very un-Lantern-like fashion they are willing to sacrifice Earth while they learn to harness the forbidden power of fear which they are certain will do the bastard in... yeah despite all that Reynolds' Hal Jordan- who by all accounts in the movie is a piece of garbage Green Lantern- [until, that is, he finds that "something" in him that the Lantern ring saw in him...but still nobility will only take you so far, if you can't kick ass- which Jordan most assuredly can't- you wouldn't stand a chance in hell against this fear sucking son of a bitch] decides he will take on the thing alone... which he does... and wins... in one of the most ridiculously anticlimactic fight scenes ever. Nice work guys, that sucked.) Sorry for all the spoilers. I mean, I guess I should say, sorry for anyone who managed to follow that convoluted rant and thus realize the spoilers. Good luck with that. But anyway. Added to that messy beginning is a pretty obviously superfluous bad guy type- Peter Sarsgaard's Hector Hammond- who only serves to underline some of the mushier parts of the moralistic back story. Again, no, thank you. Actually, it's kind of a shame that Hector Hammond was such a useless character. Sarsgaard has always been money in the bank, particularly when he plays complicated or creepy dudes. Hammond is the latter and Sarsgaard brings him to life in a way that few people could.
Actually, the movie's cast was pretty solid. Reynolds plays Hal Jordan as a paradoxically arrogant and insecure fighter pilot/sex machine. Blake Lively proved to be more than up to the task of playing the sultry Carol Ferris. Well, I don't know if she was originally sultry or not, but it's clear that Campbell went to Lively and told her, "Be sultry. Period. I don't want anything else." So she did. And did well. The problem is that she also kind of hinted she do more than that. She could add nuance. For that, I assume she will be cut from the inevitable sequel (which despite all this venom, I will go see... because I'm a glutton for punishment). Tim Robbins brings his considerable acting chops to the table as does Mark Strong who- in the biggest upset/surprise in movies this year- does NOT play the villain... yet anyway. His character's name is Sinestro. Sinestro. I think we all see where this is heading. And they conveniently/irritatingly leave a huge plot point involving him completely wide open... to the point where you kind of think they were just sloppy and forgot about it...except that it is SO glaring that you realize their ignoring it is just their idea of a clever way to set up the inevitable sequel.
Anyway, you get the idea, I imagine. It just didn't work. The story, the effects (anyone who wasn't a human looked stupid. Just plain dumb.), the pacing (the story stalled on boring/preachy elements of the movie and glossed right over the action sequences), the tone. None of it worked. The only saving grace of the movie is that the filmmakers somehow landed pretty considerable talent who- despite what must have been their better instincts- gave it their all and delivered decent performances. Too bad the Campbell and company dialed up such a crappy arena for the performances. Let me put it this way, they did the best they could with a 13 year old's handwritten script. And you know what that amounts to in the end? Not a whole lot.
Grade: D
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