It took Warner Brothers and DC Comics at least two decades
too long to finally create a Wonder Woman feature film. Easily the most
obviously commercial superhero idea for the cinema since 1989's BATMAN success
and they couldn't be bothered to sit down and figure it out. I can guarantee
you that even a bad Wonder Woman film would have made a boatload of cash and it
seems that everyone not involved in the decision making process at Warners knew
this. Madness.
The good news is that the new WONDER WOMAN (2017) is
actually a very good film and easily one of the best of the year so far. For
the backstory of the character they have chosen one of the more straightforward
versions i.e. the one most people are vaguely familiar with from the old
television series. The timeline is shifted to the first World War from the
second which doesn't change anything important but adds a sense of nostalgia to
the tale. Maybe it's just me but there have been so many films about WWII that
having this one set in the earlier war makes it more interesting. It places the
two American characters closer to the volatile period of the 1800's making
their friendship all the more fascinating. Of course, it helps that Chief seems to be a sly presentation of Apache Chief from the old Super Friends cartoon and
part of the pantheon of other gods Diana will meet in her time among men. I
can't wait to see what they do with his character in future WW stories.
The only real problem I had with the film was that the story
they tell is simply a retread of the story of the first Marvel Captain America
film. The shift to WWI is a way to hide that fact but once you recognize the
plot it's a little hard to not see the parallels - especially when the Steve
Trevor third act exit kind of shoves it in your face. I've read a lot of
bitching about the final battle between WW and Ares which I find to be silly.
What did you expect a battle between a god and Wonder Woman to look like? This
is a comic book film, after all. I'm very happy with this film and it just adds
to my anticipation for the Justice League movie.
I often speculate about what the reaction to a particular
film might have been if it were released in the age of the internet. Would
fanboy rage have scuttled the success of certain films that were huge blockbusters
in their day? My favorite pre-internet fan rage was the rage squeal heard
around the world when it was announced that Michael Keaton had been cast as
Batman back in the late 1980's. Comic book geeks reacted as if they had been
kicked in the face by this choice and it wasn't until the dark edged film came
out that they (mostly) shut up and enjoyed themselves. But now imagine that all
those screaming fanboys had gone onto public forums and made a massive stink
about their opinion. Imagine that those negative opinions had been out there
for months and part of a large discussion/argument about this casting choice in
which these people had spent a lot of time backing up their feelings with
hundreds of words typed condemning the film sight unseen. Imagine the emotional
investment these people would have in seeing this film fail so that they could
be proven right.
Universal has been trying to find a way to bring their
incredibly lucrative monster films back to big screens for years. The
misbegotten Mummy films of Stephen Sommers were profitable but were much more
copies of the Indiana Jones movies than anything resembling the dark tales of
the classic 1930's and 40's. The 2010 WOLFMAN film was very good but it's
graphic violence and dark tone put off enough of the audience that it didn't
make enough money to spark sequels. 2014's DRACULA UNTOLD was an interesting
attempt to start a new round of monster stories but it was a little too generic
to fuel the interest needed for a franchise.
Now we have what is going to be the first in a series of big
budget monster films and Universal has learned a couple of lessons from the
franchise successes of the last decade. First, cast movie stars and second, set
up your next movie in your current one. To those ends THE MUMMY (2017) stars
Tom Cruise (cue fanboy rage) and Russell Crowe while making a larger universe
of creatures central to the film's story.
Of course, Universal attempting to bring their monster ideas
to the screen for a new generation has been met with the expected fan-rage. A
huge subset of these people will not be happy with anything done to resurrect
this idea so it doesn't really matter what is done, they will whine. But others
actually give voice to the concern that the governing concept being used is too
much of the action adventure mold rather than the horror genre. This complaint
I can understand to a degree as I despised the Sommers Mummy films as the
broadly comic action disasters they were. For me it would be important that - if
we were not going to be allowed to have violent period werewolf films - that
these new Universal films somehow manage to avoid the snarky childishness of
the Sommers films.
I'm happy to report that THE MUMMY (2017) is a pretty darned
fun modern day action adventure film with more than enough horror elements to
push it into the dark area I was hoping to see. Tom Cruise plays his typical
arrogant jerk who finds himself in the middle of a supernatural nightmare that
gets him killed, resurrected and central to a plot that might destroy his soul.
The film is well paced and lays out it's ideas very effectively introducing the
darker concepts as it goes along. There is humor in the film but, although in
one scene it teeters on the juvenile, I found it actually funny instead of cringe
inducing. The movie borrows from past films I love (AN AMERICAN WEREWOLF IN
LONDON, LIFEFORCE) but folds these steals into its story well enough for me
enjoy them and not be annoyed. The introduction of Crowe's Jekyll character
adds a nice tone of world building although I think the frequency with which he
has to take his medication is terrifying. The mummy villainess is a wonderful
creation both from the casting of the lovely Sofia Boutella and the visualizing
of her powers being manifested. It is in these sequences that this movie makes
its claim as a horror movie and I think it
succeeds quite well.
But, of course, we live in the age of the internet. This
film was judged BAD before it hit the screens and condemned to the scrapheap
without a chance at big time success. I suppose that Universal's Dark Universe
will limp along on momentum for at least on more film but fan-rage has done
it's work again. We're long past the days when a film was judged on what it is
instead of what a loud fanbase expects. Now we have to make up our minds about
a movie before we see it and then, to avoid being called traitor, stick to that
prejudgment regardless of anything else. THE MUMMY will become another in that
long line of movies like THE WOLFMAN (2010) that finds it's audience years too
late to matter while the fanboys go off in search of their next outrage to
decry. After all, someone has to protect us from liking the wrong thing.
THE LIST
KILLER FISH (1979) - 7 (rewatch)
WAX MASK (1997 )- 3 (rewatch)
WONDER WOMAN (2017) - 9
THE MUMMY (2017) - 7
KILLER SNAKES (1974) - 3
WHITE LINE FEVER (1975) - 7 (truckers vs big business)
SANTO VS THE RIDERS OF TERROR (1970) - 4 (El Santo in the Old West fighting lepers and bandits)
SCENE OF THE CRIME (1949) - 8 (excellent film noir)
HERCULES, PRISONER OF EVIL (1964) - 5 (watched the Italian original version)
LA BAMBOLA DI SATANA (1969) - 5 (Satan's Doll) (mediocre giallo in a castle)
FIRESTARTER (1984) - 4 (rewatch)
THE ADVENTURES OF CAPTAIN FABIAN (1951) - 6 (solid Errol Flynn/Vincent Price tale set in New Orleans)
SUICIDE SQUAD (2016) - 7 (extended edition)
SHADOW ON THE LAND (1968) - 6 (TV movie about a fascist America)
DIAMONDS ARE FOREVER (1971) - 7 (rewatch)
CREATURE WITH THE ATOM BRAIN (1955)- 6 (rewatch)
UP FROM THE DEPTHS (1979) - 3 (terrible killer Corman produced giant fish film)
PLEASURE CRUISE (1931) - 6 (fun little pre-code tale of infidelity)
THE SECRET SIX (1931) - 6 (bootlegging gangsters - amazing cast!)
THE DOLL SQUAD (1973) - 5
2 comments:
Fan rage is just so damn pathetic. Months before its release, the fan boys were bashing Wonder Woman as well. Where are those idiots now? Telling everyone how bad Justice League will be. Ridiculous. Wish they'd just shut the f up.
Totally agree about the Mummy. Good film, possibly crippled by fan expectations and unreasoning rage. Not hard to find reasons to dislike a film when you've decided you won't like it in advance. But I thought it quite a good attempt. (I didn't like Wolfman, because it was far too depressing with no likable characters. Drac was entertaining but not suitable as a basis for a franchise -- unless it was a Fist o' Bats franchise.)
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