Batman, Wolverine and Robocop, or why Darren Aronofsky should make a blockbuster

 As you are probably aware, Jose Padhila's Robocop reboot of Robocop opens in the UK on Friday, and I for one can barely contain my apathy. It's important to point out that I haven't seen the film yet, and early reviews have been surprisingly positive, so perhaps I'm being overly harsh.

The point is, though, that there was a time that I was genuinely excited about this movie - about four years ago when it was first in pre-production. The reason I lost my excitement had little to do with the Batman-wearing-a-cycle-helmet redesign, and more to do with the change of director. Robocop 2014 was originally going to be shot by Darren Aronofsky, the visionary film maker behind Black Swan and Requiem For A Dream.

Aronofsky seemed the perfect choice. Ever since his debut, Pi, his films have had an unsettling element of body horror (think of the pounding migraines of Pi's lead character, or the close ups of the protagonists abused and twisted bodies in The Wrestler or Black Swan). The thought of what Aronofsky could do with a half-man, half machine (all cop) protagonist was trouser-tentingly exciting. Clearly, however, Aronofsky's ideas were too terrifying (and presumably too R-rated) for Hollywood executives, who passed on his vision in favour of a relative unknown.

This isn't the first time Aronofsky has developed a tentpole movie, only to fail to see it through to the end. A couple of years ago he was involved in development on The Wolverine. Hugh Jackman reported they wanted to do a stand alone, R-rated Wolverine movie set in Vietnam in the '70s. Once again, the idea of what Aronofsky could do with an immortal character in an R-rated film is impossibly tempting. Fast forward to 2013 and The Wolverine is a fairly generic 12A superhero movie set in modern day Japan.

Finally, the best known unmade Aronofsky movie must be Batman: Year One – the film which eventually became Batman Begins. Although the original comic book doesn't exactly lend itself to body horror there are plenty of Batman villains I would love to see Aronofsky take a crack at (Two Face, Killer Croc, and Bane to name just three).

Perhaps Aronofsky's true place is at the fringes of the mainstream. As a director he arguably has the best and most exciting oeuvre of the twentieth century, and if he had been distracted by these blockbuster movies we might never have had classics like Black Swan and The Wrestler. It's also entirely possible that, had he stuck at them, his versions of Batman, Wolverine and Robocop would have been turgid, generic, compromised mush, ruined by studio meddling and bereft of any of the style and intelligence that he has brought to the films that he has made. 

By God, though, I would like to have seen what he could have done with these iconic characters. Please, someone, give this man a blockbuster.

Gravity – Movie Review

Gravity opens with the most jaw-dropping special effects shot since Sam Neill saw his first Brachiosaurus in Jurassic Park. Planet Earth stretches out before you, whole, three dimensional, real. In one long, unbroken shot we are introduced to our lead characters as they float through the void, above the audience, in an utterly convincing depiction of modern space flight. Instantly the film makes the best use of 3D seen in the modern age – this film needs to be seen in the cinema.

Our lead characters, Dr Ryan Stone (Sandra Bullock) and Matt Kowalski (George Clooney), are doing routine repairs on the Hubble space telescope, when they get word that a cloud of debris from a damaged satellite is heading their way. As the previously routine mission spins out of control the visual virtuosity continues. Director Alfonso Cuaron throws every trick in the book at the audience – space debris flies towards the screen, the camera flows seamlessly through an astronaut’s visor and into a POV shot, and floating water bubbles land on the camera lens. Gravity is an aggressively stylish film that rivals the work of Fincher and Scorsese for flair and audacity.

Praise is also due to stars Bullock and Clooney, as the jittery rookie and smooth old-hander respectively. Clooney, playing to his strengths, slides back into the easy charm shtick that has served him so well since ER, and reminds you what a likeable screen presence he can be. Bullock, meanwhile, is a revelation, in the more challenging of the two roles, and gives a performance which a) finally puts the ghost of Miss Congeniality to bed and b) must now be considered the hot favourite for Best Actress come awards season. (Special mention must go to the scene where she finally breaks down under stress, which had hardened cynics all around – including myself – pretending they had something in their eye.)

Sadly the script, and the science, can’t quite live up to the quality shown elsewhere. There is an inherent tension in the core premise between scientific realism and disaster movie thrills, and the film expends so much energy trying to create a sense of scientific verisimilitude that it’s especially disappointing when it doesn’t live up to its own exacting standards. As the film moves into its third act, implausibility becomes an increasing problem, and it’s sad that a film which impresses so much with its credibility at the beginning, has you crying “Bullshit!” at the last moment.

There are also moments where sentimentality, cheesiness and cod profundity threaten to overwhelm the good that has gone before. One particular moment, where Clooney is forced to spell out a message that really should have been implicit, is awkward and jarring.

It will be interesting to see how posterity treats Gravity. My instinct is that, on the small screen, and in 2D, its flaws will become glaringly obvious. Don’t let that happen to you. Gravity doesn’t reach the heights scaled by 2001, and never really properly makes its mind up as to whether it wants to be a philosophical science drama or an action thriller. It is, however, a towering visual achievement, an overwhelming spectacle, a rip-roaring action movie, and the best fun I’ve had in a cinema in at least six years.

5/5

Man Of Steel Review.

The Man Of Steel. Superman. Kal-El. The Last Son of Krypton. The Big Blue Boy Scout. Sent as a baby by his parents to seek refuge from his dying home world, young Kal-El is raised by humans Martha and Jonathan Kent as their own son, Clark. Gifted great power by Earth's yellow sun, the young Kryptonian becomes Superman, a hero and an incorruptible symbol; fighting for truth, justice, and the American way. You know this already. This is well-trodden ground. Any film trying to re-tell Superman's origin story desperately needs to add something new to surmount the overwhelming sense of familiarity. Man Of Steel fails miserably.

 

Man of Steel copies Batman Begins' structure of front-loading its opening hour with prologue mixed with flashbacks, but whilst in Batman Begins Bruce Wayne's flashbacks were prompted by his conversations with Ducard, and used Bruce's relationship with his father to explore Bruce Wayne's own psyche, in Man Of Steel Clark Kent just wanders around by himself, remembering his childhood. He doesn't actually have a conversation with anyone until 25 minutes after his first appearance. This bizarre decision robs the flashbacks of any context, because the adult Clark has no-one to discuss his memories with.

 

Therefore we learn about the young man and his father, but nothing about the man he has grown up to be. It's a fatal problem, as we're left with a blank page where our lead character should be.

 

Furthermore, whilst Kevin Costner is perfectly cast as Jonathan Kent, Clark's adoptive father, there's way too much of him. The very fact that he's played by Kevin Costner tells us everything we need to know about this character, and his character is given no space to develop beyond this despite his significant screen time.

 

This first hour kills the film. It's overlong and almost entirely redundant, and the rest of the film, when the plot actually starts, feels rushed by comparison. Scenes lurch drunkenly from one to another without impact or suspense, and it feels like whole chunks have been cut out of the film to make it fit an already hefty 243 minute running time. Key plot points are introduced and then discarded (much is made early on of the potential impact the discovery of alien life could have on society, but once Superman is revealed to the world the reaction of society is never once shown or discussed), and some of the plot holes boggle the mind.

 

With so much time devoted to the prologue there's no time to get to know any of the characters we are then expected to care about once the actual plot kicks in. This problem is compounded by several poor casting choices. Russell Crowe delivers an enjoyably tough, if ultimately unconvincing take on Jor-El, but Amy Adams singularly fails to muster the required bolshiness to convince as Lois Lane and Laurence Fishburne is a painfully timid and bland Perry White. These are all fine actors, but they each get so little to do except run and shout that their performances have to be judged against the original comic book characters. On that basis, they fail.

 

Michael Shannon, as the villainous General Zod, fares little better. Shannon normally has a commanding presence, but the the film's attempts to give him credible motivations founder under director Zack Snyder's weirdly selective ADD disorder. An early opportunity to explore Kryptonian society and give his motivation a proper underpinning is abandoned in favour of an extended chase ripped straight off of Avatar. Zod's actions therefore make little sense and he ends up seeming even more ludicrous than Terrence's Stamp's portrayal (and not in a good way).

 

The one thing that isn't rushed are the action sequences. With the exception of one stand out, four-way Kryptonian smackdown that consciously echoes Superman II, all succumb to the Transformers CG overkill syndrome. Most blockbusters now end with 25 minute CGI cartoons and Man Of Steel is no exception. There are so many explosions and buildings blowing up that I estimate the civilian death toll must have been in the tens, if not hundreds, of thousands (this, of course, is not commented on) and yet it's devoid of tension because the main character's invincible and the other characters are all just cyphers. Superman gets thrown through something and then someone else gets thrown through something and something blows up...

 

At the time of writing I finished watching it 111 minutes ago, and I already can't remember what happened. It's that boring.

 

Rating: 1/5

 

 

Reviewed by Andy Croucher.