Review #1,305: 'Justice League' (2017)

So here it is. After four years and four movies of universe-building and origin stories, the heroes of Warner Bros.' DC Universe are finally brought together to face down a common foe and unite under the Justice League banner for the very first time on the big screen. Such an impressive roster of supers in a time when superhero mania is at its highest should have been a safe bet at the box-office, especially since Marvel's B-list characters like Ant-Man and Doctor Strange have been pulling in $500-600 million worldwide. How Justice League limped to just $700 million worldwide on the back of little to no fan anticipation speaks volumes about audience investment in this DC Universe. Patty Jenkins' Wonder Woman won back some faith, but returning director Zack Snyder has learned nothing from the criticism and backlash Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice received.

This is the same turgid, ugly and CGI-infested world started by Man of Steel, complete with one-note characters, headache-inducing fight scenes and plain bad storytelling. Yet, due to Snyder leaving the project in post-production as a result of tragic family circumstances, this makes up roughly half of the movie. The rest is purely Joss Whedon's input, after The Avengers' helmer was brought in to tighten up the film, re-write certain scenes, and take charge of the necessary re-shoots. Reports have surfaced recently that Snyder's rough cut was simply unwatchable, and sensing another critical panning, Warner Bros. simply cut their losses. Even the re-shoots were news worthy, as Henry Cavill, sporting an impressive moustache for his role in the upcoming Mission: Impossible - Fallout, was under contract to keep the facial hair, and so his upper lip would need to be altered with special effects. Naturally, the final film - which had a reported $300 million sunk into it - is a catastrophic mess.

Superman is dead, and the world has sunk into a state of despair. After taking down an alien scout during one of his crime-busting jaunts, the ageing Bruce Wayne, aka Batman (Ben Affleck), senses that a bigger threat is coming to Earth. A rich man in a stealthy suit won't be enough to tackle such an enemy, so he proceeds to round up his new friend Diana Prince, aka Wonder Woman (Gal Gadot), and hunt down those meta-humans glimpsed on Lex Luthor's laptop in Batman v Superman. There's Arthur Currie, aka Aquaman (Jason Momoa), the long-haired, tattooed Prince of Atlantis, Barry Allen aka The Flash (Ezra Miller), a motor-mouthed, incredibly annoying young man whose superpower is to run really, really fast, and finally Victor Stone, aka Cyborg (Ray Fisher), a half-human, half-machine hybrid who was created by his father with the help of a mysterious artefact called a Mother Box. There's two more boxes, and a giant alien warlord named Steppenwolf (voiced by Ciaran Hinds) hopes to snatch up all three.

You can work out almost on a moment-by-moment basis which segments were filmed by Snyder and which by Whedon. One second, were in the dour, unattractive world of Snyder's mind, where every character broods and walks in slow-motion. The next, we get quippy Batman and bright colours. Justice League became such a farce in post-production that I get the feeling the heads at Warner Bros. simply wanted rid of it, as this simply isn't the finished version of 300 million dollars worth of input. Steppenwolf's appearance changes from one scene to the next, and Cavill's moustache-removal is one of the most unnerving things I've seen on film. "We're not enough," claims Batman, and so Superman is dug up and brought back to life for the final act. Despite his weird CGI face, Cavill is actually one of the few pleasures of Justice League, as we finally get to see the hopeful, unstoppable Superman we have been waiting three movies to see. Sadly, his comeback is far too late to save the movie. For all its plot-holes, poorly-constructed action scenes and many other flaws, Justice League's biggest crime is that it is, inexplicably, just plain boring.


Directed by: Zack Snyder
Starring: Ben Affleck, Gal Gadot, Henry Cavill, Jason Momoa, Ezra Miller, Ray Fisher, Amy Adams, Jeremy Irons, Diane Lane, Connie Nielsen, Ciarán Hinds
Country: USA/UK/Canada

Rating: **

Tom Gillespie

Review #1,022: 'Trumbo' (2015)

Jay Roach's Trumbo, like many recent biopics so accurately lampooned in Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story (2007), plays like a film version of a Wikipedia page, covering all the necessary key events from the topic's life without so much as attempting to dig beneath the surface of the man at the centre of it all, ushering in actors to do their best impressions of famous people, a device that seems to serve as a 'spot the movie star' game for the audience as opposed to having much of an immediate effect on the story. You may leave the film a bit more educated on the subject of the infamous 'Hollywood Blacklist', but you'll learn little about Dalton Trumbo himself.

The film is far too polished to truly transport you back in time to the 1940's and 50's, failing to achieve a 'lived-in' sense of time and place. Beginning with Trumbo (played by Bryan Cranston) on the set of Our Vines Have Tender Grapes and on the verge of signing a contract that will make him the highest-paid writer in Hollywood, his affiliation with the Communist Party of the USA comes under scrutiny by gossip columnist Hedda Hopper (Helen Mirren) and actor John Wayne (David James Elliott), with the latter seen delivering a speech on the threat of communism. Trumbo, along with other screenwriters, are called to testify by the House Committee on Un-American Activities, and find themselves blacklisted from Hollywood when they refuse to answer questions.

What follows is little more than the key points in the history of this frightening abuse of free speech by a country that prides itself upon its democracy. It's a topic that will anger, confuse and frustrate you, but the film fails at doing the story any kind of justice by demonstrating a startling lack of emotion. Cranston, who somehow received an Oscar nomination for his efforts, seems to sleep-walk through the proceedings. Every line he is forced to deliver seems to be plucked right out of a Hollywood movie, almost as if it is destined to be someday carved into stone. Having loved Cranston since Malcolm in the Middle, I don't blame him for the limp performance. Director Jay Roach has made a career out of mediocre comedies, and he doesn't seem to possess the skill to convincingly juggle the facts with any resemblance to character development.

The people surrounding Trumbo are a collection of biopic archetypes and Hollywood celebrities. Trumbo's relationship with his wife Cleo (Diane Lane) predictably goes from solid to strained, as the lengths he must go to in order to find work begins to take its toll. On paper, Helen Mirren as Hedda Hopper seems like an Oscar in the bag, but her antagonist is painted in such broad strokes that she may as well have been called Rita Skeeter, On a positive note, the only character acting like a believable human being is Frank King, a larger-than-life B-movie producer played by John Goodman, who employs Trumbo, working under a pseudonym, to doctor his scripts. He arrives like a force of nature, breathing fresh air into a film so utterly devoid of life. For a more informative and intimate film on the subject of the genius Dalton Trumbo, check out the 2007 documentary, also called Trumbo, instead.


Directed by: Jay Roach
Starring: Bryan Cranston, Diane Lane, Helen Mirren, Louis C.K., Elle Fanning, John Goodman, Michael Stuhlbarg, Alan Tudyk
Country: USA

Rating: **

Tom Gillespie

Review #1,007: 'Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice' (2016)

With the phenomenal success of Marvel's 8-year (and still going strong) moulding of their cinematic universe, the fashionable goal for studios now seems to be to create a vast world for their ensemble of characters to co-exist and occasionally cross paths. Marvel's output now includes some of the highest-grossest films of all time, so it was never going to take other studios too long to realise the potential in their comic-book property. Fox's X-Men franchise expanded itself this year with Deadpool, and the box-office success of Man of Steel in 2013 now have publishing behemoth DC flexing their muscles.

Subtlety isn't something Zack Snyder, director of 300 (2006), Watchmen (2009) and Sucker Punch (2011), is known for. Like Joss Whedon at Marvel before his departure, Snyder has been employed as head honcho for DC's expanded universe. Rather than taking the time to build the world from the ground up and teasing fans with what's to come, Snyder throws everything (including the kitchen sink in one scene) at Man of Steel's follow-up, which introduces a seriously pissed-off Batman into the mix, as well as a hoard of famous and not-so-famous fellow superheroes who are all due their own stand-alone movies in the future. To summarise, Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice is a colossal mess.

Picking up during the climax of Man of Steel that saw Superman (Henry Cavill) cause mega-destruction and the deaths of thousands of people during his fisticuffs with General Zod (Michael Shannon), Bruce Wayne (Ben Affleck) arrives at Metropolis to witness the carnage first hand. This older, more damaged Batman holes up in his mansion and discusses Superman's alien threat with his trusted butler Alfred (Jeremy Irons). An unsupervised being of almost unlimited power, Wayne sees Superman as a threat to humanity and hopes to turn the public against him using his influence at the Daily Planet newspaper.

Meanwhile, billionaire eccentric Lex Luthor (Jesse Eisenberg) takes a special interest in Superman, and convinces Senator Finch (Holly Hunter) to allow him access to Zod's fallen spacecraft as well as the General's body. Wayne learns of Luthor's activities and attends one of his gatherings in the hope of stealing encrypted files, and learns that a mysterious woman by the name of Diane Prince (Gal Gadot) is also seeking the same thing. Knowing that Superman and Batman will always stand in his way, Luthor imports Kryptonite from the Indian Ocean and begins to set in motion a great battle between the two, from which surely only one will walk away.

The plot seems to only concern itself with the bigger picture, with its eyes firmly on the Justice League movie due next year, Without any sense of immediate threat and with such an emotional detachment from its characters, it's extremely difficult to care about much that happens during Batman v Superman. It's all too much, too soon. On top of the muddled plot, Snyder throws in glimpses of future members of the superhero team - The Flash (Ezra Miller), Aquaman (Jason Momoa) and Cyborg (Ray Fisher) - that act like mini-trailers jammed into the middle of the movie without much thought, and a seemingly random, yet beautifully captured, dream sequence that foreshadows the big bad Darkseid.

Most of the characters motivations are left unexplained too. While Superman's actions with Zod left catastrophic damage, the public are pretty clear that they view him as a hero fighting an alien threat, even concocting a monument in his honour. So why is Batman so utterly pissed at him, especially when Superman doesn't even harm him during their first encounter when he could have snapped him like a twig? Luthor, played by an Eisenberg who seems to believe he is on the set of Adam West's 1960's TV show, is hell-bent of neutralising Superman's threat. Does he have daddy issues? A fear of God? Luthor rants like a teenager hyped-up from sugar and video-games and hints at these and many others, but no real explanation is given. And just what was he hoping to achieve by unleashing the part cave-troll, part what you couldn't flush down the toilet this morning, at the end?

The movie's main positive is Affleck. The groans echoed throughout social media when his casting was announced, but he nails both Bruce Wayne and Batman. He is the Darkest Knight there has ever been, with a brute physicality that could flick Christian Bale's incarnation across the screen. Snyder has the skill to bring a comic book panel to life better than anybody, and Batman v Superman is frequently astonishing to look at. Gadot also excels during her small amount of screen-time, and is the only one appearing to be having any fun. Of the smack-down itself, it's an exciting and brutal affair, brought to a close by one of the most ridiculous moments of mutual enlightenment in cinema, ever. Like Man of Steel, Batman v Superman has defied mixed (and some utterly unforgiving) reviews and stormed the box-office, so I think it's safe to say that the DC train will plough on.


Directed by: Zack Snyder
Starring: Ben Affleck, Henry Cavill, Amy Adams, Jesse Eisenberg, Jeremy Irons, Gal Gadot, Diane Lane, Laurence Fishburne, Holly Hunter, Scoot McNairy
Country: USA

Rating: **

Tom Gillespie

Review #944: 'Inside Out' (2015)

A film will come along perhaps once every few years that has a profound effect on me to the point that I view the world slightly differently than I did before. Inside Out - the majestic and extremely moving latest effort from Pixar - is one of those films. Pixar's back catalogue is a stellar line-up of classics, with even the lesser titles having something going for them, but I believe Inside Out is there finest to date. It's a brave, emotionally complex story that will likely leave some children depressed and adults even more so, but this is mature film-making of the very highest order.

A girl named Riley (Kaitlyn Dias) is born into the world, and her mind instantly starts to develop her core emotions. Joy (Amy Poehler) is first to arrive and forms an instant bond with Riley. Soon enough, she is joined by Sadness (Phyllis Smith), Fear (Bill Hader), Anger (Lewis Black) and Disgust (Mindy Kaling), as Riley's personality begins to develop. Joy rules the roost during Riley's happy childhood, but as the years go by and Riley moves to a new city, the other emotions start to influence her actions. After a minor breakdown in front of her new classmates, Riley struggles to adapt to the changes, and Joy and Sadness find themselves whisked off into the deepest regions of her mind while the others struggle to steady the ship.

Pixar have never lacked visual imagination (they are the great innovators of computer animation after all), and they have worked overtime with Inside Out. What begins as a playful portal into the mind of an immature girl, the setting becomes more layered as she grows. Branches stretch out to reveal various aspects of Riley's personality, core memories are collected and stored in glowing spheres, and there is a literal train of thought that runs throughout the mind. The creativity is truly let off the leash when Joy and Sadness get caught up in the abstract thought region, and find themselves quickly morphing from a Picasso-esque form to two dimensional to nothing more than a straight line. The fearlessness of which directors Pete Docter and Ronnie Del Carmen approach the subject matter is one of the many endearing things about Inside Out.

Along Joy and Sadness's journey, they encounter Bing Bong (Richard Kind), a ridiculous amalgamation of cat, elephant and dolphin with a candy-floss torso, who turns out to be Riley's childhood imaginary friend. As she has matured, Bing Bong has slowly been forgotten, and spends his time watching old memories. Providing welcome comic relief as well as providing an insight into a more innocent and care-free time of Riley's life, Bing Bong may just be Pixar's most ingenious creation. Well aware that his time may soon be up as he is forgotten completely, he selflessly aids Joy and Sadness (as well as hindering their progress with his constant bumbling). He is an immensely loveable but ultimately tragic character, and Pixar gracefully avoids intensely pulling the heart-strings in favour of something more emotionally honest, achieving a harder gut-punch in the process.

If you go in expecting a cuddly family movie then you may be disappointed. The opening third is more interested in developing its vast, intricate world and developing the bond between the host and her emotions than delivering prat-falls and goofy voices. The human brain is a wonderful, fascinating place, and Inside Out revels in exploring its endless possibilities. It also teaches a thing or two about how we work by lumping Joy and Sadness together, two complete opposites of the same spectrum who could not exist without the other. Children's movies have always leaned towards pure escapism, a world in which true horror is either non-existent or easily defeated, but Inside Out shows us that its normal, healthy, and ultimately inevitable, to experience sadness. I don't like to throw the term 'masterpiece' around, but this is the closest Pixar have come to pure perfection.


Directed by: Pete Docter, Ronnie Del Carmen
Voices: Amy Poehler, Phyllis Smith, Richard Kind, Bill Hader, Lewis Black, Mindy Kaling, Kaitlyn Dias, Diane Lane, Kyle MacLachlan
Country: USA

Rating: *****

Tom Gillespie

Review #669: 'Man of Steel' (2013)

Dumping the light tone of the original Richard Donner Superman films (1978/1980) and their ridiculous sequels, as well as Bryan Singer's failed reboot, Zack Snyder's Man of Steel adopts the Christopher Nolan approach. With Nolan as producer and co-writer, this is Clark Kent seen through the eyes of a steely, saturated lens, with Henry Cavill's somewhat stoic and monotone Superman battling inner demons as well as General Zod (Michael Shannon). It's a typically long, convoluted modern blockbuster, but Man of Steel prevails thanks to some surprisingly dedicated focus by Snyder, who abandons the slo-then-fast-mo stylings of 300 (2006) and Sucker Punch (2011) for something much more grown-up.

The movie begins on Krypton, where Jar-El (Russell Crowe), delighted with the planet's first natural birth in centuries in his son Kal-El, pleads with the leaders to help save the planet from inevitable destruction. Enter the usurping Zod, who is leading a coup to overthrow the leaders and re-establish Krypton as a real power. Zod is furious at the birth of Kal-El aka Clark Kent, but Jar-El manages to blast his son off into space towards Earth before Zod overpowers him. Cut forward some years and Kent is working on a fishing vessel, at ease with his powers. When the military discover an alien craft in the Arctic, Kent infiltrates the mission and discovers his origins from the preserved conscience of his father. Meanwhile, Zod is approaching Earth with plans to use the planet to re-create Krypton.

It's clear from the off that this is no regular superhero origin film. Snyder manages to somehow bring a grounded realism to Krypton - giant human-carrying dragonflies and all. We then skip Kent's entire upbringing to witness his natural inclinations for good as he saves some oil rig workers from certain death, displaying the powers he is now at ease with. Through some beautifully realised and melancholy flashback scenes that evoke the style of Terence Malick, Kent's parents (played by Kevin Costner and Diane Lane), gradually teach him that he is different and has a much greater purpose than he could imagine. Costner is superb in these moments, bringing an old-hand, gravel-voiced weight that I have never seen from him before. Similar to Snyder's Watchmen (2009), these flashbacks are peppered throughout the film, yet don't damage the flow of the central story.

Where the film fails is in the action-heavy climax that lasts for pretty much the entire final hour. Zod and his cronies battle Superman and smash each other to a pulp. It's very similar to the climax of Thor (2011), that also had impossibly strong super-beings battle ten tons of shit out of each other because, well, what else can they do? Buildings collapse, explosions litter the screen, but there's very little tension. It switches the action between Superman and the Daily Planet, where Laurence Fishburne's Perry White serves no purpose other than to save some people from falling rubble. Perhaps it's setting the scene for future instalments, but they seem rather intrusive here.

The same could also be said about Amy Adams' Lois Lane, who is a spunky, determined character diminished to a simple love interest for Kent without any real chemistry. Of course she's important to the Superman universe, but there is no real dimension to her persona. Michael Shannon, however, is reliably excellent in his role, and his Zod incarnation is by far the most interesting thing about the film. He's a sympathetic bad guy akin to Tom Hiddleston's Loki, to the point where you can fully understand his reasoning. The man plans on genocide, but this was the role he was raised to play, and his determination to re-establish his race is certainly understandable. You can even see that Superman knows this, but he always knows that he must destroy him, whatever the odds.

Overall I was extremely impressed by Man of Steel, and its flaws can certainly be forgiven. This is a mature movie with underlying themes. Superman is God, an indestructible force (to us mere humans) that possesses too much power to be at ease with, even when he assures them that they are on the same side. The religious metaphors are embarrassingly obvious at times, but it's a thought-provoking sub-theme and a nice alternative to the crash-bang-wallop of the action scenes. Although it's not up to the ridiculously high standards set by Christopher Nolan, this can sit nicely alongside his Dark Knight trilogy (2005-2012) in the re-imagining of DC's universe.


Directed by: Zack Snyder
Starring: Henry Cavill, Amy Adams, Michael Shannon, Diane Lane, Russell Crowe, Kevin Costner, Antje Traue, Laurence Fishburne
Country: USA/Canada/UK

Rating: ****

Tom Gillespie