I loved the intro sequence. Right away, you can tell we're going to be in a heightened reality of sorts, as the universe doesn't quite look realistic. Its a bold choice though, almost a fairytale version of an alien sector of space. The only thing missing is the Book of Oa opening like a true fairytale would (And Salakk, of course). The exposition at the beginning has an effect that is sort of like cave paintings made of light. The blending of the concepts of Krona, Legion and Parallax into one character is an interesting choice. I never thought I'd see the story of Krona, Legion, and Parallax considered for live action...ever, let alone blended together. Just enough is said about The Guardians to interest us in the concept while leaving some mystery. The scene with the crash-landed aliens is a bit awkward, but I think its neccessary to allow Parallax to escape. And right from the start, Parallax makes for an appropriately creepy and disturbing villain.
Abin Sur being depicted as the Lantern who overcame and imprisoned Parallax is a nice touch, gives him a nice stature amongst the Corps, and gives a decent and believeable reason for his untimely death. It was nice to see him get some combat with Parallax, brief as it was. Temuera Morrison does a very nice job with Abin Sur in a short time onscreen.
Hal's introduction on Earth is admittedly a bit cheesy, but its also appropriate as the character is being presented. There's a nice bit at Ferris (Side note: How cool is it to see Ferris Industries finally onscreen?) where Hal and Carol show their markedly different approaches to life while still trying to appease each other, and then we're off into a heck of a dogfight, getting to see Hal do what he does best. Take risks while flying planes. And that was really well done, and I was glad to see Hal and Carol flying together, at least for a little while. Shades of Top Gun of course, but also very much its own thing. At first, cutting Hal's memories of his father's demise into his plane crash is a bit awkward and jarring, but when it became apparent what was going on, it became an interesting choice, and it makes for an interesting character element. I do wish the quality of the film during the flashback had some sort of nostalgic or nightmarish element to it, or had evolved as the sequence wore on, but its a minor quibble. Despite the different ages of the actors, there is definitely some decent chemistry between Hal and Carol, especially when they are arguing or she's chewing him out, and when his risk doesn't appear to pan out like he wanted it to, you can see him trying to feel guilty over it, even as he thinks what he did was right. Pure Hal. And its pure Carol to find the silver lining in his actions and use that to better everyone's situation.
I like the scene with the Jordan family, as simple and short as it is. Its very telling. Hal is a screwup, even to his own family. The scene with Jason is revealing, too. He's not supposed to be afraid, and he's telling the world that he's not by overcompensating, facts that he won't admit to until later, but he is. Love that they bothered to have Hal shoot the car off the racetrack before he leaves Jason's room. Also, kudos to the filmmakers for casting a kid who looks and acts like a real kid for once as Jason instead of a weird mop of hair with no soul. I was a little disappointed that we never came back to Hal's nephew, or his family after this, but Jim and Jack don't really belong in this story, and didn't have to be here, though it would have been nice to see, in a longer version of the film.
That said, in one of the most perfectly awkward and joy-inspiring moments I've recently seen in a superhero film, Hal gets just unceremoniously grabbed by an orb of weird green light and ripped off to be dumped into an adventure. That's just perfect. Hal racing to save the alien without much hesitation is note perfect. Abin Sur's dying speech is very well done. He doesn't milk the death as other superhero actors have done, he just dies with dignity, having survived long enough to pass on his ring and what to do with it, fighting for breath to whispher words like "honor" and "responsibility". I could have done without Hal's "No no no don't do that" when Abin is dying, but it works in context.
I'm glad that Hal involves Tom in his discovery of Abin Sur, and I'm equally glad to see that the writers nixed that silly "Tom takes Abin Sur's spaceship home and fixes it" plotline from the old script, because that was just too much to swallow. I do wish Tom had a bit more to do in this film, but his time onscreen is welcome nontheless. He served his purpose in the capacity of their job together, and as Hal's friend, he provides an audience identification character for a bit, albeit a loud and rather animated one. That's basically, as far as I know, the role he always had in the comics until The Last Will and Testament storyline happened.
I was hoping for something a bit more classic for Hal's first ring charging sequence. Something with Hal standing, ring to the lantern he's holding in the classic pose, etc. This scene threatened to devolve into Ryan being Ryan at first, with his recitation of classic oaths of power (which was kind of funny) and his frustrated "Come onnn!", but Reynolds really sold the overall moment here, with the first recitation of the oath, and it was pretty powerful stuff to hear his voice sober and break before he ever realizes the impact of his words.
The scene between Hal and Carol at the bar is welcome and fairly genuine. I'll go ahead and say it now. Their relationship may actually be the best and most believeable romantic chemistry we've seen in a recent DC superhero movie in a long time. Seriously. Because its the most natural. They just worked really well together. Hal's beating at the hands of his former coworkers after he leaves is pretty brutal for a movie like this, and I'm really glad to see the reasoning behind it. Because he kind of deserves it at this point, and its what is needed to drive home the point, for him to hit rock bottom. I love that his first construct is the forever-classic giant fist/boxing glove. Love that. Perfect choice. And then, yet another orb of weird green light rips him off into more adventure.
The trip to Oa isn't quite as awe-inspiring as a flight through space could be, but its cool enough, awe-inspiring enough, and Reynolds sells it well. The induction process was a bit more organic than I had expected it to be, and fairly painful looking. I wonder if the ring really needs all those implanted elements, but it did help the merge the relative magic of the ring with a type of alien pseudoscience, and the first shot of Hal's glowing, lantern-adorned chest is pure gold. Tomar-Re is almost perfect. Geoffrey Rush's voicework struck just the right balance of whimsy and wisdom to sell the character. The flight sequence where Hal discovers Oa was really just okay, though it was nice to see Hal doing flips and barrel rolls and acting like, well, a kid who's acting like he's become a plane. Oa itself kind of underwhelmed me. It was well designed for the most part, and quite sprawling, but also a bit cluttered, making it hard to take much of it in. I would have liked to have seen it from street level, and seen a bit more of the Corps on Oa going about their daily lives. The Corps gathering sequence was fantastic. Sinestro's speech to the other Lanterns, seen in previous clips or not, is incredible, as is his recognition that Hal has big boots to fill and the Lanterns' reaction to that. And of course its cool to see all the classic Lanterns there, whether we get to hear them speak or not. The training sequence with Kilowog could definitely have been longer, but combining Kilowog's sequence and Sinestro's makes for a fairly satisying introduction to such matters. What is there is very satisfying, and mattered later on in the film. The point was obviously not that Hal was going to be training longterm here a la Batman (and had the sequence continued along those lines, it would have been one more derivative and generic element in this film) and to recreate that type of sequence, but that he didn't think he could handle the weight of being a Green Lantern and quit, forcing himself to learn on the job and bringing his own personality to ringslinging. That was a choice made by a filmmakers as part of Hal's overall character, and while it is not what I and many would have preferred, I can't fault them for sticking with it and committing to it here. It made for a more compelling conflict in the end, and felt more "Hal". Otherwise, his whole "I can't do this" approach would ring really, really false.
Hal's time on Earth after he returns to Oa is for one purpose. To learn that giving up was wrong, to learn to be a hero, and to learn how to take responsibility. And he does, in grand fashion. I loved that he used a giant green racetrack to save the helicopter during his first appearance as Green Lantern. That was clever stuff, and it was just...right. It reminded me of the slides and chutes and such that he used to make in the silver age, updated for a modern audience, with just enough of a dash of childhood magic to it. His first appearance at Ferris is just right in my mind, from Carol doing what she can to help out, to Hal rescuing Carol and giving her to her father, trying to pretend like what he did is no big deal, and getting the heck out of there. Green Lantern is a man of few or no words here. He speaks less than Batman does here in his first appearance, and something about that and Reynolds stoic performance reveals his realization of the importance of his new powers.
Hal meeting Carol later on as Green Lantern is fantastic. Love his dark, whispery voice. Love his half-cheesy-but-half-serious cowboyish attitude. Love the fact that for half a second she doesn't see through him, and then when she does she just freaks the hell out, and he just thinks its hilarious. Sure, it would have been nice to see them go flying together, either in planes or with light...but that's Superman's territory, and two Superman movies have already done that, and done it well. So instead we see them where they belong. Overlooking Ferris industries, the place that has shaped them both, and talking about what Hal screwed up, and what matters, and what he has to do now. I do miss Hal making Paris out of green light for her, though, as in a previous draft of the script.
Hector Hammond's arc, threaded throughout the film, is grotesque, and creepy, and disturbing, which is exactly what it should have been. They. Nailed. It. Saarsgard does a really nice with a very basic and simple idea. A lot has been made of how useless Hector Hammond was. Well...yeah. That's because he was supposed to be. The whole point of the film is that Hal uses his newfound power responsibly and with honor, despite an initial rejection of it, and Hector does not, and uses his power for self serving purposes, despite initially embracing it. I really can't bring myself to care that he didn't rob a bank or have any major plans, because thats the point of Hector Hammond, and always has been. A largeminded fellow turns out to be smallminded. A lot has been said of his lack of character development, but he's no less interesting than Scarecrow in BATMAN BEGINS was, or than any other supporting villain for that matter. Hector Hammond never was anything but a man who wasted his potential and his power in the comics. Here, he wastes it on personal issues while Hal gets over his own and uses his power to help others. He's designed to be a foil and a mirror for the hero, and thats what he is. Hector kills his father in a pretty cold and disturbing manner, and what his father apparently plans to allow to have done with Hector was a bit jarring as well. Eventually, he can't stand himself as he is, uses his power to threaten the woman he supposedly loves, and reveals that all he really wants is power, and not her...and that..that I thought was just creepy stuff. Genuinely creepy and evil. I don't really care whether he knew Hal or Carol before, or how well he knew them, or the details of their life before this movie. That didn't really have much to do with anything, other than to explain that he has followed Carol and her career and resented her love for Hal, and that was there as plain as day, and believeable enough. They live in the same city...they could easily know each other.
I really liked Hal admitting to Hector that he understands fear, and asking him to let him help him. I'm really glad to see there was a "Hal gives up the ring to a villain" sequence in the film. Cliche or not, that's also classic Green Lantern stuff, and a neccessary point of his origin, the realization that its not all about the ring. The resolution of that is fantastic, with the power ring's blast not harming Hal, and Hal's line "You have to be chosen". Carol, who had been the damsel in distress previously in this scene, does more than a lot of female leads have, saving Hal from Parallax with some quick thinking. When Parallax arrives (I got a kick out of how Parallax suddenly just appears there outside the windows), Hector's death is appropriate and grisly. Not sure what "You have failed me" means from Parallax. I assume its that he didn't finish Green Lantern off, but its a minor quibble.
And then Hal does exactly what he should have done in this situation. Flies to Oa and appeals to The Guardians. And we get another classic Guardian moment, where they reveal that they may not be as beneficial as they originally appeared. The refusal to help Earth in order to save their own Corps, and themselves for the time being. And Hal's recognition of that and his stubborn refusal to accept it. His speech to them then has just enough of an earnest edge to make me believe I was listening to Hal Jordan from the comics. It's like he doesn't quite know how to say it yet...but knows he needs to, and so even though he's unsteady and unsure, he does.
There's a lot of whining online that Parallax is depicted a RISE OF THE SILVER SURFER-esque Galactus type cloud that looks like a giant bowel movement. Maybe. But Parallax is much cooler than Galactus ever was, has more to do with humanitys own issues and the issues of Hal Jordan, and was generally scarier, if not as large in scale. The concept apparently had to be Krona, and it had to be Legion, and it had to be Parallax, and it does incorporate all those elements in a sense. Fear is an ugly, dirty, excrementous, crawling, reaching thing, and so to me, the design makes sense. There was something about that roiling mass of fear-ridden souls that was just eerie. What Parallax did to innocent people was pretty scary. What he represented was scary. Fear itself being the villlain is a pretty bold choice in general. Seeing Hal face the living embodiment of fear...people are really complaining about that because the cloud of fear's motivations that feeds on the fear of others weren't complex?
Hal VS Parallax is awesome. One of the cooler and more unique action sequences in a while. At first I didn't think a giant cloud would be very threatening, but though the sequence is broadly drawn, the stampeding, terrified crowds of Coast City do serve to provide a decent bit of emotional stakes. The battle doesn't quite have the kinetic impact of a Spider-Man fight, or the impact of a fistfight between Batman and Ra's Al Ghul, or the technical wizardry of Iron Man VS Iron Monger, but there's something cool about its scale and the nature of it anyway, the dark magic VS light magic approach. And I was really happy to see that no one felt the need to explain what was happening every three seconds. When Reynolds yelled for the innocent bystander to run, I knew for sure that he was an appropriate Green Lantern. He has a heroic stoicism and presence to him that just works for the character.
The sequence where Hal, about to buckle under the power of Parallax, recites the oath and finds new energy and light to fight Parallax, is very well done. Granted, the way that Hal ultimately beats Parallax is a little odd, leading him a merry chase through space and into the Sun in a use of power sequence that is a tiny bit awkward...but it wasn't bad, and it was actually pretty satisfying to see the space cop embrace his element and what little he had learned from the others to defeat Parallax. And then I realized that not only had he done that, but he'd used the ultimate source of light to do it, to destroy the dark, corrupted yellow energy of Parallax. The jets he uses to bolster himself were appropriate, and could easily represent Hal and Carol or Hal and his father flying side by side (I know, that's not there, but work with me, it should have been). Yes, it would have been nice to see The Corps show up to help out a bit, and to protect the people of Earth, and to take part in a massive battle, or at least some of them. But A, that would be time consuming and expensive. This movie obviously didn't have an unlimited runtime or resources. B, this is Hal's test. C, where would the sequel go after that? After you show 3,600 Lanterns show up to help out on Earth, what do you do for an encore? Show it again? Show it in space? I think its fine to want to see a ton of Green Lanterns in action, but to denounce the entire idea of the Corps within the film as failed because we didn't get to see the full potential of it in the first film is a bit silly.
Structurally, I would definitely have liked more of a denoument at the end of the film. Something with Amanda Waller coming to terms with just what is out there, something with Carol and her father (actually, the film needed some of this anyway), maybe something with Hal and his family, something with Coast City realizing the impact of Green Lantern's arrival and rebuilding. Really, the lack of Coast City's "reaction" to Green Lantern, or rather, the degree of it, is one of the weaker elements of the film, though there are a few moments detailing it after he appears. The moments between Hal and Carol and his recognition of his newfound responsibility are well done, and the way the film ends, with Hal being represented as one of the distant stars in the sky is also well done, calling to mind what Tomar Re told him about the stars and the Corps members earlier in the film.
I thought it was one of the best superhero movies from the 90's, along with "The Rocketeer".
