Fantastic Four-“Fantastic” Turkey Jerky
Fantastic Four isn’t that fantastic. Its what you would expect, weak on story, even though it was directed by a guy whose last name is Story, Tim Story to be exact. The CG is very nice at points, but problems abound in this money grab budgeted at $90-$110 million. Fantastic Four will keep your attention, but if you are over about 14 or 15 and have half a brain, you will probably be wondering when it is either going to a) get better or b) end. Rest easy it does end, eventually as it is over in about two hours.
There is only one star in the Fantastic Four and that happens to be the CG. Once again, Hollywood opts for throwing so much sparkling crap up at the screen that they hope you don’t notice that they have once more employed a talentless hack. The treatment of science in the movie is a major problem once again as we see a writer wipe his butt with science to move his script along. Science is increasingly being swapped out for magic and this plays some part, however large or small I can not say, in many people’s perception that they do not like science-fiction. Fantastic Four is not science-fiction, it is fantasy that drags science around as a crutch. The explanations used to explain how the Fantastic Four, become so fantastic, is weak stuff. I don’t know how you scientifically explain a guy becoming a giant, super stretchy condom or another guy spontaneously erupting into fire. I don’t know, but I also know I haven’t given it any thought and I haven’t been paid to do so either. The abuse of science is pretty extreme and easily makes the half-ass “science” of Spider-Man look solid and the “science” in The Day After Tomorrow look like scientific fact.
The “story” I will condense, consider it dehydrated. Rich scientists, space station, weird radiation, implausible audience insulting effects due to radiation exposure, rich scientist goes nuts, rich scientist becomes evil, Dr. Doom, Fantastic Four discover fantastic powers, stuff blows up, stuff gets crushed, stuff gets destroyed, studios make lots of money-about $300 fantastic millions, we get more crappy sequels. Yeap, I think that pretty much sums it up.
The real star again happens to be the army of underpaid folks that slaved away at workstations, miss meals with their families, worked weekends, gained weight, lost hair and worried about losing their jobs. Those folks, are the stars of this one, more so than on other big-budget Hollywood action “sci-fi” flicks in recent memories. Without those folks you have the Fantastic Turkey–dehydrated which I guess means Fantastic Turkey Jerky. I’ll leave it at that.
Story F (For Christ sake, this guys last name is Story and you’re a director in Hollywood, step up to the plate man! This is an embarrassment. Obviously, the writers simply said, “This thing is based off some comic book, I don’t have to work hard on the script.” Or, at least, I would like to think they didn’t work hard. The notion that the writers worked hard on The Not-So Fanatic Four, is pretty horrifying.)
Acting C- (You call this craft service!? Where’s that paycheck dammit!?)
Visuals B+ (The films only salvation are its visuals.)
Originality/Innovation F
Enjoyability Grade D+
Home Theater/HD Factor B+ (Interesting work by the CG slaves at their workstations will make this fun in HD, just keep the sound off for your own good.)
Overall Grade D+ (Could you write a better script with say six months to do it? Probably.)
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