If there is one thing I love about Green Lantern it’s the Oath, “In brightest day, in blackest night, No evil shall escape my sight. Let those who worship evil’s might. Beware my power–Green Lantern’s light!” The question is has DC Comics and Warner Brothers hit movie gold with the new Green Lantern movie which stars Ryan Reynolds as Green Lantern and Blake Lively? Or have we got another ‘Spirit’ on our hands? Having just seen it I can assure you that Green Lantern is not genius and it is not magical but it is a few steps up from a stinker.
The premise to start; “Green Lantern” stars Ryan Reynolds in the title role of Hal Jordon aka The Green Lantern under the direction of Martin Campell, in a film based upon characters appearing in comic books published by DC Comics. In a universe as vast as it is mysterious, an elite, powerful force has existed for centuries. Protectors of peace and justice, they are called the Green Lantern Corps.
Each Green Lantern wears a ring that grants him the ability to create anything his mind can imagine. But when a new enemy called Parallax threatens to destroy the balance of power in the Universe, their fate and the fate of Earth lie in the hands of their newest recruit, the first human ever selected: Hal Jordan.
Ryan Reynolds is one of my favourite actors and I have followed his career over the years as he went from indie Canadian projects to full blown Hollywood blockbusters. Ryan Reynolds work in Blade Trinity was the only redeeming part of an otherwise atrocious movie and he also delivered a command performance as DeadPool in the Wolverine spin off. So needless to say I had expected that he would bring that same level of charisma, wit and bad ass attitude to Green Lantern but unfortunately as much as we might wish we don’t always get what we want.
Green Lantern is a splashy affair that is heavy on the CG and very light on any kind of context or serious emotion or deep subject matter. You won’t feel yourself connecting with Hal Jordon and if you are looking for any of Ryan’s trademark humour you will be sadly disappointed. The script is about as weak as a drink at the local old folks home and the characters are all unfortunately incredibly shallow and cliché. Blake Lively as talented as she is is stuck in a role and performance that can be summed up with the word irrelevant. The chemistry between the two on stage is forced and her role is so minor and unimportant they could have cast a waitress from the local burger joint and gotten as much from her as they did from Blake.
Green Lantern is a popcorn movie. A one shot action flick with a man in green tights, epic battle sequences and lots of over the top effects. But it is also full of plot holes, loose ends is horribly cliché and unfortunately is also horribly anti-climatic. The movie although entertaining feels rushed and incomplete and in the last 8 minutes seems to be going 100 miles an hour to wrap up the movie but not actually accomplish anything.
Just because they roll credits doesn’t make the movie feel complete or reward the audience and the Green Lantern felt like there was a shortage of film and perhaps the world really was coming to an end so we better wrap this puppy up now.
Clearly Green Lantern is setup for a sequel but I left the theatre thinking it wasn’t a complete waste of time but it wouldn’t part with my money for a sequel. Green Lantern lacks the depth and intensity of The Dark Knight and it lacks the complexity of great films like Kick Ass, 300, Batman and even the first Spider Man movie. The Green Lantern is a classic comic book movie that has been spun into a movie franchise that should have been better thought out and developed. The film is at best a 6 out of 10 and most of that is because it has a strong source material but due to mediocre direction and poor use of an incredibly talented cast the movie is ‘ok’ at best and far from the best.
See it if you are a huge Lantern fan but otherwise let this one escape your sight.
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