BATMAN v SUPERMAN
Something is getting worse and more frequent in Hollywood movies like this one: mixed bags. I'd like to say this movie is good, but its problems are serious. I'd like to say it's just bad, but its good parts are extremely good. I'd need to divide the movie in three parts and assess them individually.
ACT I: Magnificent. It was what I thought was one of the very best superhero movies I'd ever seen. I was so happy feeling a real serious movie about these characters could be possible like this. Motivations and problems for both the main characters were solid.
ACT II: Okay, too much going on but cool. What's with [BLACKOUT]that desert sequence and the "guy with the red mask"? Made no sense (I don't want to think he's the Flash, even when I know it, because of that moustache and because it had nothing to do with the story, the tone or anything in the movie).[/BLACKOUT] Ok, never mind, the rest is still good.
ACT III: Could anyone please, even Michael Bay, put any more [BLACKOUT]noisy numbing action with any more explosions and violence and things that appear out of nowhere? [/BLACKOUT]It's like you didn't go over the top but over the universe at this point. [BLACKOUT]Let's just throw Doomsday there, then let's make him bigger and have him flying and throwing rays 3 minutes later. Let's have Superman dying, then resurrecting, then dying again! Then resurrecting again![/BLACKOUT] If once is cool, twice must be twice as cool, right?
What worked.
Affleck is the best Batman since Keaton. Affleck possessed both Batman and Bruce Wayne and did spectacular. His feelings felt genuine and his energy flowed naturally (one thing I never felt in Bale, for example, that always felt to me he was trying too hard). I hope his personal bat-movie gets made. But please, Ben, shave! This character is Bruce Wayne and when he goes to a fancy party he shaves. Shaving once a week is your thing, Affleck, both in and out of the movies, but that is you, not your character.
Cavill is a great Superman, and I'm glad he had to fight constantly to show people who he really was. It felt absolutely real in such a cynical world where good can be twisted and presented as evil to the public if you have the money. It's not that he hated being Superman, but being the good guy in this world costs a whole lot and he battled his way.
What didn't work.
Everything Justice League. There was simply not room for it and it didn't match anything else in the movie or the plot. Those scenes were totally shoehorned there. Even Wonder Woman appeared just to [BLACKOUT]show off a little, but had nothing valuable to contribute to the story, which at that point was pretty much defined without her. Even her theme was garbage: didn't match the soundtrack or the tone of the movie at all and didn't make sense for the character (an ancient amazon trying to make sense out of this world? Let's use electric guitars to make her feel a cool character).[/BLACKOUT]
As I said before, the final confrontation was just CGI and violence porn. At some points it was laughable how much bigger they wanted to make things for the sake if it.
The movie should have been Batman vs Superman, period. Their motivations to fight each other were very well developed (I loved they used [BLACKOUT]Man of Steel's final battle as the starting point and didn't just shrug it off as these movies usually do. *coughavengerscough*[/BLACKOUT]), and Luthor pulling the strings in the middle of it was good (although I didn't like Eisenberg's Lex much, how difficult is to portray Luthor well?). But when they started introducing new elements randomly then the movie started to collapse.
One thing I appreciate for sure, even with all the problems, is that they care about the characters and take them seriously for once. Those reviews accusing the movie being "humorless" made me laugh. Since when is humor a must in these movies? Specially considering most humor in superhero movies is frankly poor and gratuitous. But all in all I couldn't blame anyone who disliked the movie as if the last part of a film is bad, it makes the whole thing look bad.
3/5