Fantastic Four

Released:  August 7^th, 2015

Rated:  PG-13

Distributor:  Twentieth Century Fox

Starring:  Miles Teller, Michael B. Jordan, Kate Mara, Jamie Bell, Toby Kebbell, Reg E. Cathey

Directed by:  Josh Trank

Written by:  Simon Kinberg, Jeremy Slater, Josh Trank

Personal Bias Alert:  haven’t seen any previous Fantastic Four movies, likes the cast

4 of 10

            It’s not often that this big of a film completely lacks a purpose.  Many things have to go wrong to get such a product (a wobbly script, a director failing to impart his vision, misguided studio intervention, etc.), and it’s bold of Fox to so brazenly try to pass Fantastic Four as a decent movie.  Then again, a big-budget superhero flick can’t be buried with a pushed release date and minimal marketing like Sony Pictures did with Aloha, this year’s other conglomeration of scenes that was allegedly a movie.  Of course, Fantastic Four isn’t as big of a mess as Aloha; the individual scenes do make sense, they just never really go anywhere.

            The truly frustrating thing about this film is how great we all hoped it would be.  The cast for the superheroes and villain is a delectable slate of youngish talent that’ve had integral parts in many massively successful film and television projects, and the writer/director (who’s younger than some of his cast) was coming off a small-budget flick that impressed critics and viewers alike.  But alas, young talent can be unstable, and while the cast holds up their end, Josh Trank dropped the ball in nearly every way.  There’s reports of poor behavior and squabbles with the studio, but the finished product shows flaws that can be traced directly back to his pre-production decisions.

            The storyline that Trank seemed to be going for is depressingly familiar, almost an exact rehash of what he did in Chronicle.  Some young people discover their power (here, it’s science), their powers build until they become abusive and start harming themselves and others, then one of them becomes a bad guy that must be stopped by the rest of the group.  The fun that set apart Chronicle, though, was the comradery between the boys and a well-plotted descent that drew from each character’s background.  Trank, who didn’t write the actual screenplay for Chronicle, fails to bring this plotting and character development to Fantastic Four, leaving us with a bigger but lesser film.

            What Trank does manage to get right, at least for a while, is the young characters’ naive enthusiasm.  To start Fantastic Four, the brilliant team works together to design and build an interdimensional teleporter.  There’s joy in these scenes, a sense of bonding, and even if this section does drags on too long and is hampered by poor dialogue, it’s still the section where the cast and the film shines the brightest.  Eventually, the group actually gets to the other planet, and that’s when the movie loses what little it had going for it.  It succumbs to Franklin Storm’s (Reg E. Cathy) moralistic grandstanding, and any sense of character, fun, or even narrative purpose is lost.  In fact, Cathy is so shrill in his terribly written speeches that his eventual fate made me cheer instead of sniffle, and that level of unintentional hatred is glaring evidence of just how bad this movie becomes.

            But hey, it’s a superhero movie, so at least there will be dizzying CGI action that sustains its clunky plot, right?  No, Trank doesn’t even give us that.  There’s only one small, poorly conceived, flabergastingly simple ‘battle’ in Fantastic Four, the failure of which seems to stem from Trank being unable to grasp the character’s new, superhuman powers.  Granted, several of the powers in this group are quite silly (one’s stretchy and another is literally a rock), but not only does Trank fail to come up with an interesting way to use these powers in a battle, he doesn’t even come up with a way to shoot them so that they look cool.  The Human Torch and Invisible Woman become distorted when they use their powers, losing all sense of facial and bodily expression.  They are reduced to blobs moving around onscreen, which Trank failed to realize and hence tried to sell a dramatic moment between Invisible Woman and Dr. Doom (whose stiff design is equally hampering) that ends up as one of the most emotionally inert moments on film in 2015.  As for everyone else, stretchy Mr. Fantastic just looks silly, and The Thing is never more than a side thought in the entire film.  Getting the superheroes right is key to any superhero flick, making Fantastic Four’s belly flop in this area one of its most glaring failures.

            All this being said, Fantastic Four isn’t quite as bad as everyone is saying it is.  It’s certainly not good, but its plot is coherent and the actors occasionally find some fun in the script.  My suggestion?  Keep the actors, but get a team that will make the script and visuals match their abilities.  Maybe then we’ll get a good Fantastic Four movie.

Other Notes (Ridiculous Superhero Version):

Ø  Why did Invisible Woman struggle so much with her powers while at the facility but seem to have incredible control once they started fighting?

Ø  Why did Dr. Doom run away from the world in the first place?  Is he just a jerk?

Ø  Where did the cloth for Dr. Doom’s hood thing come from?

Ø  Why is The Thing so powerful?  Rocks aren’t actually indestructible.

Other Notes (Regular Version):

Ø  Why did the boys not invite Sue when they went to the other dimension?  She helped build the teleporter too!

Ø  Like all good scientists, they immediately touched the thing they’ve never seen before.

Ø  Funny that this movie was made so that a company (Fox) could keep the rights to Fantastic Four when the movie rails against corporate meddling.

Ø  Boy was that ending line (or lack of line) gratingly obvious.

Insurgent

Released:  March 20^th, 2015

Rated:  PG-13

Distributor:  Lionsgate

Starring:  Shailene Woodley, Theo James, Octavia Spencer, Jai Courtney, Ray Stevenson, Zoë Kravitz, Miles Teller, Ansel Elgort, Maggie Q, Naomi Watts, Kate Winslet

Directed by:  Robert Schwentke

Written by:  Brian Duffield, Akiva Goldsman, Mark Bomback

Personal Bias Alert:  liked its predecessor, read the book

5.3 of 10

            In defense of this film, I would like to point out that its source material isn’t that great.  I thoroughly enjoyed reading Divergent, even if it was a familiar and ham-fisted plot.  That’s why reading Insurgent was such a letdown, as the few interesting ideas that were present in the previous installment were dropped and the book became a chore to read.  The simple fact is that its author, Veronica Roth, struggles with plotting, character, and emotional description, leaving you with some thoroughly pedestrian writing.  That this series came after the popular and very well-written Hunger Games only accentuates its downfalls, so it comes as no surprise to me that the movie series takes a similar step back in its second outing.

            Insurgent picks up mere days after the events of Divergent, with heroine Tris (Shailene Woodley), boyfriend Four (Theo James), Brother Caleb (Ansel Elgort), and fickle alliance member Peter (Miles Teller) hiding out from the Erudite-Dauntless members who are trying to overthrow their society.  Remember, their dystopian society is based on splitting everyone up into different factions based on personality, making divergents like Tris and Four, who exhibit traits from several factions, extremely dangerous.  That last fact can mostly be forgotten, though, as Insurgent focuses more on Tris and Four’s attempt to take down the mastermind of the Erudite-Dauntless alliance, Jeanine (Kate Winslet), than any major attempts to root out divergents.

            One of the major downfalls that the Insurgent film is forced to carry over from the book is the overwhelming amount of plot.  In fact, the second book ends where most series would end, cramming what should have been two books into one so it can go off to who knows where in its third outing (which I haven’t read).  Pretty much everything else is sacrificed, most notably any hint of world building even as it introduces the audience to new factions within this society.  Without any examination, each new place feels so cookie-cutter thin that the system makes even less sense here than in the first film, and too often explosion-heavy dialogue is leaned on so it all makes sense.

            This was adapted by a trio of writers (which is rarely a good sign), none of whom have stellar track records (an even worse sign).  As I’ve said, they were given rough source material to work with, and even if they failed in certain areas, they did reconfigure the plot into a streamlined, quick-paced action story.  This, along with the brisk score, is the saving grace of the film, as any faults are quickly forgotten as you try to keep up with all the new developments.  Revelations and twists are being thrown at you constantly, and even though it’s frustrating that they aren’t being explored, Insurgent is a thoroughly entertaining ride while you’re on it.

            The Divergent series is rightly accused of being derivative of other YA series, but the film series does face one unique challenge:  almost every actor has a robust career outside the series.  Winslet, Naomi Watts, and Octavia Spencer have all been part of many financially and critically successful films over the past decade, and much of the younger cast have found similar balance in their careers since Divergent’s release.  Winslet, Teller, and Jai Courtney were so busy they were actually filming other movies at the same time as Insurgent, and perhaps it’s the combination of everyone’s busy schedules and the lackluster material that led to the uninspired performances that permeate this film.  Everyone seems only mildly focused, more spitting out the lines than imbuing them with any meaning.  The biggest letdown that stems from this is the complete disintegration of Tris and Four’s relationship, which Woodley and James pulled off quite nicely in the first film but feels entirely wooden here.

             There’s advantages and disadvantages to a dense plot, and most of them can be found in Insurgent.  While it barrels right along at a pleasing pace, it isn’t very engaging from an emotional standpoint, leaving the film entertainingly shallow.  You likely won’t hate it while you’re watching it, but you’ll also probably forget it as soon as the lights come up.

Other Notes:

Ø  The action is a bit underwhelming, with lots of running and gun fighting that is off-puttingly shot, and there’s nothing anywhere near as visually interesting as the fear simulations from Divergent.

Ø  Random Janet McTeer!

Ø  This is the first film I saw in Carmike’s ‘Big D’ format, which features a larger screen, bigger sound, and nicer seats.  The seats were comfy, but the larger screen made shots seem vaguely blurry and the sound was far too loud.