Wonder Woman

Dir: Patty Jenkins

2017

***

Hailed incorrectly by many as the first ever female superhero-lead movie, Wonder Woman might as well be. I’m not hating on Supergirl, Catwoman or Elektra but..actually I am hating on Catwoman and Elektra, they were awful, Supergirl is an overlooked masterpiece but not quite right in terms of authenticity. 2017’s Wonder Woman has been hotly anticipated for quite some time, and in many respects the pressure was on to get her right, even more so than the other members of the Justice League, including Superman and Batman. I’m not sure why it took so long really, Batman proved he could be something more than a camp comic-strip in the late 80s and the comics themselves have shown Wonder Woman as the kick-ass superhero that she is for several decades now. So getting her to the screen was half the battle, so I celebrate her big screen debut like everyone else. I read reviews on the film’s first day of release, most were titled something along the lines of ‘Finally, a Superhero for women’ or ‘A female Superhero young girls can finally look up to’ and after watching the film myself I whole-heartedly agree. First and foremost, Gal Gadot’s portrayal of Diana Prince is near perfect. I say Diana Prince as that is who she really is in the film, she may have the costume but her Wonder Woman persona isn’t quite revealed. However, apart from Gal Gadot and the title character, I found the film to be somewhat underwhelming. There are many elements of the film that I did like, I just don’t think the amounted to anything extra special and I think mistakes were made. As far as the story goes, I thought it was a perfect take on Wonder Woman’s classical origin story. It’s pretty authentic, except for some subtle changes, although many of these changes have a appeared in more recent comic books. I loved that this was her journey, from naive idealist, to global superhero. I like that an appropriate amount of time was given to explore her relationship with her mother Hippolyta, Queen of Themyscira (played by Connie Nielsen) and her aunt and secret trainer, General Antiope (played by Robin Wright). Both Nielsen and Wright are awesome in their roles, as are the other Amazonians. Themyscira looked pretty cool too. I loved the development of Diana Prince’s character and the climactic bad-guy reveal was a piece of brilliant writing. I just don’t feel like an awful lot happened in the 2 hours + of footage. Some exterior shots looked like they were made for TV and some of the special effects moments looked like they were out of a late 90s Spice Girls music video. Much like the previous DC movies, the film desperately needed some colour and a bit more of a visual style and some flare. I didn’t like this version of Steve Trevor at all either. Chris Pine seemed like a good choice at first but unlike in all the Star Trek films he’s been in, I could only see Captain Kirk in his performance. It was like watching Wonder Woman and Captain Kirk fight in World War I together, which would have sounded great as a kid (and who knows, it’s probably happened in a comic somewhere) but it didn’t work for me here. I also think he should have been more of a damsel, like he is in the comics, this was supposed to be a female superhero film after all. Don’t get me started on the love scenes and the painful dialogue that accompanied them, I found them to be painful and unnecessary. I get that it took a bunch of World War I solders to teach Diana how to be a hero, and I liked Saïd Taghmaoui, Ewen Bremner and Eugene Brave Rock's characters, I just don't think they fit that well into the story and I'm afraid they were all portraying horrible stereotypes. I think the most interesting character of the whole film was Elena Anaya portrayal as one of Wonder Women's recurring villains Isabel Maru / Doctor Poison. Doctor Poison is a bit rubbish in the comics but this film adaptation of her is brilliant and full of depth. Danny Huston's General Erich Ludendorff is pretty standard if I'm being honest but David Thewlis's character/performance more than made up for it and ended up being the film's highlight - other than Gal Gadot. Overall I thought Wonder Women was brilliant, the character and the performance. The story was good too and I liked the twist at the end. I just thought the picture was in the wrong hands. Monster was a great film but director Patty Jenkins hasn't made a great deal since and I think she was the wrong choice for a big superhero flick. Marvel have pushed the boundaries so far far that I couldn't help but feel underwhelmed by the film in general. There was nearly a great scene but not quite. Every Marvel film has a great scene, the more recent ones have around three of four, Wonder Woman had half of one. I just think the visuals were below standard and let the strong story down and Wonder Woman deserved much more. I'm over the fact that Sandra Bullock nor Lucy Lawless ever made it in the role (as was mooted back in the early 00s) and I'm thrilled we finally have a female superhero film that holds it's own. I just think too many mistakes were made and DC need a re-think when it comes to their visuals. Also, I know DC don't want to go there but a Linda Carter cameo would have been nice.