The Not-So-Fantastic 4 [My Blog! My Blog!]

Last weekend,

esrblog and I went to see the latest Fantastic 4 movie.

No spoiler cuts are necessary for any review of this one, because in overall mediocrity it was a lot like the original one two years ago.

Ioan Gruffudd, as Mr. Fantastic, made a valiant but doomed effort to be convincing in his role despite the comic-book thinness of the script. Jessica Alba, as Sue Storm, his financee, did a reprise of her unconvincing I-just-wanna-be-a-regular-all-American-girl performance from the first movie, while Chris Evans and Michael Chiklis as Johnny Storm and Ben Grimm did amiable, sit-com level comic relief.

Doug Jones, playing the Silver Surfer with the aid of Laurence Fishburne's voice, gave the most convincing performance of the movie.

esrblog, who once followed the Marvel comics on which these movies have been based closely, claims that the plot was surprisingly true to the original comics. He was particularly hostile to Alba's performance, which he dissed as "plastic", and he considers her unattractive.

Overall, not an awful movie, nor a great one. If you're not a big Marvel fan, wait till it comes out on DVD and get it from Netflix or something, and save yourself $10.

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USA Today did a story on page 1D the Thrusday before it was release lauding Alba's role as not the usual comic book heroine, but rather a strong woman whose costume covered her entire body. Sounds like they were so busy getting that set up that they forgot to give her any real character.

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That's my impression.

it's true that the F4 superhero costumes do cover the actors' entire bodies, including Ms. Alba's. However, it may be worth mentioning that, in the wedding scene where she attempts to marry Mr. Fantastic, Alba wears a strapless wedding gown that exposes a goodly amount of skin, and that there is a subliminally quick flash of her naked (to explain why would constitute a plot spoiler, so I won't bother). So it's not as though the movie makers were intending to rely entirely on the quality of her acting. To the extent she's supposed to be *playing*, as the USA Today reporter claimed, a "strong woman," she's not very convincing in my book.

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I thought the trailer was so boring that the movie probably wasn't worth seeing. The problem with this method is that I don't generally see enough movies with unpromising trailers to see whether my theory has predictive power.

I agree with your theory. Here's my reasoning. The people marketing the movie have every reason to pack as many exciting bits from the movie as possible into the trailer. (This is why sometimes the trailer is much better than the movie--there are times when the movie only has enough exciting bits to make a three-minute trailer.) So if the *trailer* is boring, that either means that the movie makers could only afford clueless marketers, or (more likely) that the movie doesn't have enough exciting bits to make a decent trailer. Either way, staying home is a win.

Actually, I think it's usually a fair guess when (as with FF), a sample of the movie is offered. If that's really boring, then there isn't much hope for the movie.

On the other hand, the trailer I saw for "The Incredibles" was a dreary bit of Mr. Incredible struggling into his superhero suit. The movie was much better than that.

You can't buy brains. Money might improve your odds, but it's no guarantee. I bet it's entirely possible to spend the usual amount or more, and still get a marketer who has a fit of cluelessness at the worst possible moment for making your trailer.

I stand corrected. It's certainly true that money doesn't always get you the best talent, and equally true that even the best and brightest screw up (consider the New Coke debacle, for instance).

P.S., I liked the trailer for "The Impossibles", but that may just have been me. :-)

Thank you! I think you just saved me $10. :-)

Good! I always like to help friends.

Personally, I'm looking forward to the 5th Harry Potter movie, which I understand is coming out later in the summer, and to New Line Cinema's take on Philip Pullman's "The Golden Compass," scheduled to be out in time for Christmas.

Re the first, me too, and I'm all but drooling in anticipation...hoping to watch it at my local IMAX theater if all goes well. (And looking forward to the seventh book of course!) As to the second, can't say I'm familiar with the book, but I'm sure I'll hear all about it by the time it comes out.

Re: Harry Potter 5 & book 7--Me too.

Re: Golden Compass--I recommend reading it. Your local library should have it in the Young Adult section. However, it's much better than that categorization might imply.

"Alba's performance, which he dissed as "plastic"
Yeah, she's got something plastic over her. It worked in Sin City, but I keep expecting her to turn all stiff limbed like a barbie everytime I see her in other movies. :)

I missed out on "Sin City". Is it worth renting?

There's a lot of violence in it and it's made to look like a comic book. Which I think works pretty good in this film. Most of it is black and white, with accents of colour. They also make a lot of effective use of silhuettes. Mickey Rourke makes what is probably one of his best acts ever. :)
Over all I like it, but it's not for the squeamish or those expecting a well thought out plot. It's mostly violence in a pretty package. :D

Like a comic book, eh? Sounds like the "300" movie.

Even more like a comic book then 300. And they are both Frank Miller comics originally. So there's to some extent a similar feel to them.

That figures. Thanks for the summary.

Sadly (or possibly tellingly), this is the kindest, most positive review of that movie I've seen yet. Every other review I've seen so far has been people warning all their friends not to get within five hundred feet of a theater showing the film.

Really. Guess I'll never make it as a movie reviewer, then. :-)

I, too, find her unattractive.
Then again, I'm a heterosexual female.
Seriously, she's somewhat pretty, but something's... off.

& then there's Ioan Gruffudd.

It says a LOT that I actually DON'T want to sit through this
just to see him...

Actually, it's his beauty that keeps me from enjoying him in
the role. HE IS TOO YOUNG TO BE REED RICHARDS, &@%$# it! He
needs at least 10 years to even begin to look right for this.

HE IS TOO YOUNG TO BE REED RICHARDS

I don't know the source material well enough to know that, but I'll take your word for it.

I do agree with your taste, though. I'd cheerfully watch Gruffudd read the telephone book, clothed *or* naked. Unfortunately, as I said, he could not manage to be convincing playing opposite Alba with such a mediocre script. But he was still pleasant to watch, except for one dumb scene where Ben and Johnny arrange a bachelor party at a local nightclub. He was fine, but the scene was so embarrassingly cliched that I found it painful to view.

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The Not-So-Fantastic 4

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