Punching Down

Conditions: Warming

Film Review: Wonder Woman

Finally, after Zeus knows how many years of development and false starts, the Wonder Woman movie has arrived.  I must admit I was surprised when they announced Gal Gadot was to be the Woman in question, I too thought her a little too slight for the role.  But I'm happy to say she made a believer out of me.  Shot very cleverly by director Patty Jenkins, and given a fierce gaze and attitude by Gal, she comes across winningly well.

Sadly, I think the movie she's saddled with isn't quite so spotless.  It's clearly modeled on the Captain America template, Diana has her backstory established as a young'un on some hidden island, before WW1 interferes and Diana goes off to fight war.  Literally.  She's been raised to believe that war is caused by Ares, the god of war, and so she has to kill Ares with her special sword in order to end it.  She teams up with Chris Pine, a jack of all trades pilot/spy/diplomat who literally dropped into her lap.  After an odd second act of trying on outfits and getting frustrated with British government and casual anti-women attitudes she and Chris are off to the front lines with a rag tag team to find and stop some evil German general from perfecting his nerve gas.  Chris thinks he'll attack London, so must be stopped.  Diana thinks he's Ares, so must be killed.

It's really when Diana approaches the front lines that the movie starts to find it's feet.  Diana finally takes charge and heads off into combat, the men trailing behind.  The film comes alive and tries to actually show Diana taking stock of what war really is like.  Things eventually get messy.  The finale is odd, in that the film tries to show that man does not really need a god to inspire it to fight, but can't help showing men stopping their fighting once the god is dead.  I guess the problem is that while the film very much wants to be Diana's movie, and provide a different kind of perspective to war (and comic book movies), it still feels it has to follow what one could say is a more typical template.  So Diana fights grunts, then fights a mini boss, then finally fights the big boss.  In a way I found the finale disappointing, I expected more, I expected a different approach.  Clearly though they've hit on something here, no doubt an enormous relief to the DC executives who are desperately hoping they can build up their characters to get some of that sweet Marvel-type money in the future.  But in truth, I just don't see how gods can really work together.  Four gauntlets out of five.



Film Review: After.Life

This is a really annoying film.  In what seems like a small town, we're introduced to Christina Ricci and her boyfriend Justin Long.  Christina is lifeless and pale, and Justin is annoying.  When Justin announces he's moving to the big city, Christina assumes he's dumping her and drives off in a rage.  She wakes up in a morgue.  A strangely calm Liam Neeson tells her she crashed her car and died.  Christina disputes this, as she is clearly arguing with him.  Liam explains that all the dead people say that, and he's getting a bit tired of it.

That's basically the movie.  Christina is lifeless and pale, and spends the movie in various states of undress as she pouts, mopes and argues in the morgue with Liam over if she's actually dead or not.  Liam claims he's special and has the gift of being able to speak with the dead, and that it takes a while for the soul to properly leave the body, and that she needs to let go.  Occasionally he gives her the chance to run outside, or stab him with something, and she demurs, and he mocks her gently for being dead before she actually died, and wasting her time before the funeral in three days.

This schizophrenic dynamic is relieved on occasion by the outside world, where Justin roams around feeling sorry for himself and yelling at people.  A supernatural element is introduced in a way that lets us suspect she really is a ghost, but then various scenes with Christina let us think she is still alive, and Liam's a serial killer.  And most frustrating of all, there's no answer to this lifeless mess.  Was Christina the plucky wan hero?  Was Liam the kindly soul-helper?  Was Justin an idiot?  Wait, that one we know.  Yes, yes he was.  One nipple out of five.


- Peace out