|
Available on DVD! To buy, click on link(s) below and help keep this site afloat (commissions earned) |
Always make sure of DVD-compatibility!!!
|
|
|
|
|
Of all the heroes that came out of the Marvel comics fold, Daredevil,
who first saw the light of day back in 1964, is quite probably the
silliest:
His origin story is pretty much identical with the one of DC-Comics'
Batman:
Here like there, the parents of our hero (though in Daredevil's case only
the father) are violently killed by some villains, and here like tehre
this left our respective hero emotionally scarred, so that, once grown up,
he dons a costume with stupid looking pointy ears every night to jump down
some skyscrapers, swing through the streets of a megalopolis, fight crime
and take revenge on wrong-doers. What sets Daredevil apart from Batman is
... he is blind - now how come nobody noticed what a silly idea that was ?
Anyways, in 2003, when this film was produced, Marvel Comics, or rather big screen
adaptations of their comicbooks, were coming back into vogue, and so, after
the successes of Blade, X-Men and Spider-Man someone
thought it a good idea to do Daredevil as well ... ouch !
The story: As a kid, Matt Murdock (Scott Terra) is blinded by some
toxic waste ... but that makes his other senses especially acute and even
gives him a new sense: radar.Shortly afterwards, he witnesses his dad
(Davkid Keith), a run down boxer, being brutally killed by some gangsters.
Flash forward to present day: Matt Murdock is now played (though played
is too big a word) by Ben Affleck, and he is a lawyer by day. However, he
must have slept through most of law school, because at night he dresses up
in a silly outfit and brutally takes his revenge on those he didn't get
convicted by day. He even doesn't refrain from killing. Still, this little
psycho thinks he is one of the good guys, and the movie wants to make us
believe just that.
Eventually, Matt meets lovely millionair's daughter Elektra (Jennifer
Garner), to whom he immediately feels drawn because her fighting skills
match his own. Of course the two fall in love, but soon enough her
dad (Erick Avari) is killed by a dart-throwing psychokiller named Bulls
Eye (Colin Farrell), but for some reason, Elektra thinks Daredevil did it
(sorry, wrong psycho), and she trains herself to perfection to track him
down ... which she does, and she even defeats him in a fight, but then she
tears off his mask, realizes he is her one true love, and breaks out in
tears ... she couldn't have picked a worse moment, because Bulls Eye is
already after her, and he brutally kills her - then he goes after
Daredevil too, but when the two fight in a church, Daredevil can kill
Bulls Eye, but not before learning that actually the gangster Kingpin
(Michael Clarke Duncan) is the brains behind it all, so he pays Kingpin a
visit and defeats him in a fight. But him, he doesn't kill, because only
now he remembers his days in the lawschool and wants to see Kingpin
convicted.
So far for the underwhelming plot of the film, which still could have
been saved by great action. But don't forget, this wasn't made in Hong
Kong but in Hollywood, so instead of breathtaking stunts we are presented
with lame CGI-effects (though some wireworks, imported from Hong Kong,
have been used). And then there's Ben Affleck in the lead, who couldn't
act if his life depended on it. And Jennifer Garner is lovely to look at
and is cute when she almost breaks out in tears, but she just can't handle
action scenes. There is actually one scene that shows the dilemma of the
two leads best: when Matt and Elektra first meet, they get into a martial
arts duel that sparks their romance. Now this could really have been an
inspired (if not all that new) sequence, if only the two of them were
better martial artists - or better actors.
However, it's not just those two, the two main baddies, Colin Farrell
and Michael Clarke Duncan also show remarkably little interest in bringing
their characters to life, not at all helped by the weak script and stupid
dialogue.
But it would be unfair to pin the failure of this film down to its bad
actors, its second-rate action scenes, its weak, cliché riddled and
reactionary script, silly source material or even its conveyor-belt
direction - it's the whole package that stinks. Don't watch it !!!
|