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| Source: Imdb |
I was
excited about this action comic book movie due to its fun trailer and good
reviews. As entertainment, it did not exactly disappoint – only in so far as it
was fairly average. The story about a boy becoming king could have been told in
a far more exciting way. I was looking forward to seeing him discover his
powers, learn how to control them and come into his own. Instead, most of that
part of the story was presented in flashbacks. When the film starts, he is
already a cocky vigilante, which is fun to watch, but I like a vulnerable hero
better. The script had many flaws, first and foremost the lame, predictable
dialogue. Many, MANY times I was able to predict the dialogue verbatim.
Seriously, zero points for creativity. The rest of the movie also stole
shamelessly from everything from LotR and Harry Potter to the Matrix and
Avatar. Furthermore, what annoyed me, was the extraordinary disregard for
physics. I’m used to being asked to suspend my disbelief, abut this was a bit
over the top (e.g. a metal suit will not protect a human falling off a cliff.
Ever. I was also constantly wondering how this energy source of their works. It
looked like electricity to me, but they are under water. It must be a hell of a
lot of work to insulate all those cables and contacts. In salt water, no less!)
To conclude with the script, the mythology was more than flimsy. Just like the
‘age’ of Ultron was about 2 days, the millennium of living under water was
enough to have several different species evolve... I would have been fine with
leaving it as an indeterminable time frame, but no! They had to be stupidly
specific about it.
The acting was good, though I did not see the point of having Nicole Kidman here. Jason Momoa was perfect casting, though. He has the physical presence to BE Aquaman. I enjoyed William Dafoe’s performance as well, and Patrick Wilson reminded me strongly of Lee Pace as Thranduil or Jason Isaacs as Malfoy. Overall, there were too many characters, though, and their connections were way too convoluted. It took me ages to figure out who is which king, who’s child is who’s sibling and what kingdom goes where. A bit more exposition would have been helpful in this case. Anyway, the kid actors were stunning, too.
Oh, and what was with the sexist sea monster? [spoiler] Only a true KING can pass it, but not the rightful QUEEN of Atlantis??? Rubbish! It made no sense that Atlana could not. And then the monster had a female voice (back-stabber!) and despite being millennia old, spoke perfect modern-day English. What?! That really annoyed me.
Visually, the effects were about average for present standards. I can see how this would have been great in 3D, though. The animations for the floating hair were of mixed quality. You could see the visual filters warring with the actual animation. Orm’s hairdo was a thing of wonder: under water, it looked like a complicated, cool braiding technique, but it was actually way too short to be braided in any way whatsoever. I wonder if that was intentional. It really bugged me. Also, for something taking place under water, they had an awful lot of fiery explosions. Editing, lighting, costumes: all pretty standard.
The overall pacing was a bit too slow. I liked that they did not draw out the fight scenes like most movies do, but there were entirely too many of them.
Finally, they do get all the points lost above back for using Sigur Rós in the soundtrack. ‘Takk’ was their first album I ever listened to and it still has a special place with me. Actually, I really enjoyed all of the soundtrack – though it was WILDLY inconsistent – and the score was great, too. It had elements from several composers, but you could hear the Gregson-Williams family heritage, even though it was by little brother Rupert. Good work!
Overall, a watcheable 3/5, but it had potential for more.
PS: this film reminded me why I prefer to watch films on my own at home: I had trouble with the acoustics in the cinema and was longing for subtitles. Particularly Jason Momoa’s snarky dialogue was largely an indiscernible rumbling to me. I would have loved subtitles! And there were places where I would have absolutely needed to pause the film to let my brain catch up.
The acting was good, though I did not see the point of having Nicole Kidman here. Jason Momoa was perfect casting, though. He has the physical presence to BE Aquaman. I enjoyed William Dafoe’s performance as well, and Patrick Wilson reminded me strongly of Lee Pace as Thranduil or Jason Isaacs as Malfoy. Overall, there were too many characters, though, and their connections were way too convoluted. It took me ages to figure out who is which king, who’s child is who’s sibling and what kingdom goes where. A bit more exposition would have been helpful in this case. Anyway, the kid actors were stunning, too.
Oh, and what was with the sexist sea monster? [spoiler] Only a true KING can pass it, but not the rightful QUEEN of Atlantis??? Rubbish! It made no sense that Atlana could not. And then the monster had a female voice (back-stabber!) and despite being millennia old, spoke perfect modern-day English. What?! That really annoyed me.
Visually, the effects were about average for present standards. I can see how this would have been great in 3D, though. The animations for the floating hair were of mixed quality. You could see the visual filters warring with the actual animation. Orm’s hairdo was a thing of wonder: under water, it looked like a complicated, cool braiding technique, but it was actually way too short to be braided in any way whatsoever. I wonder if that was intentional. It really bugged me. Also, for something taking place under water, they had an awful lot of fiery explosions. Editing, lighting, costumes: all pretty standard.
The overall pacing was a bit too slow. I liked that they did not draw out the fight scenes like most movies do, but there were entirely too many of them.
Finally, they do get all the points lost above back for using Sigur Rós in the soundtrack. ‘Takk’ was their first album I ever listened to and it still has a special place with me. Actually, I really enjoyed all of the soundtrack – though it was WILDLY inconsistent – and the score was great, too. It had elements from several composers, but you could hear the Gregson-Williams family heritage, even though it was by little brother Rupert. Good work!
Overall, a watcheable 3/5, but it had potential for more.
PS: this film reminded me why I prefer to watch films on my own at home: I had trouble with the acoustics in the cinema and was longing for subtitles. Particularly Jason Momoa’s snarky dialogue was largely an indiscernible rumbling to me. I would have loved subtitles! And there were places where I would have absolutely needed to pause the film to let my brain catch up.
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