After viewing this film at the $5 theater (thankfully), I have come to realize that TDK features an Easter Egg scene that tells us exactly what Warner Bros. was doing with this film's budget
"It's About Sending a Message..."
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Seriously, I don't see where the $300 million has gone for this project. WB would have had the same level of productivity if they just piled the money up, doused it with gasoline and lit it on fire. At least a few hobos could have gathered around for the temporary source of heat. Is this film as bad as the 24% on Rotten Tomatoes would lead one to believe? Not really. Is it a good movie? Not really.
1) Characters are too willing to accept the radical: Hal hardly questions what he sees when he finds Abin Sur. The crowd doesn't question the fact that a man with green glowing skin manages to project solid light holograms. Hal lands on OA and takes all of two minutes to get used to the fact that he is on a distant planet at the center of the universe, filled with alien life. This film does a fantastic job of robbing the audience of the pleasure of enjoying a sense of discovery, because Hal never has a sense of discovery. He just takes every new development with something that borders on apathy.
2) CG is a mixed bag: Warner Bros. swore that they were cleaning up the CG. I don't see proof of that. Of all of the great looking CG that is featured in the film, the production staff still couldn't manage to resolve the issue with Ryan Reynold's CG mask. Though I do appreciate that they brought back the black hues that make the familiar aesthetic of Hal's suit, I was disappointed to see that the production staff didn't bother to make the CG model look like Ryan Reynold's body, or a believable human body for that matter.
3) Too many plots: Subplots are always a welcome addition to help a film develop a complex narrative. Unfortunately, this film never manages to keep up the juggling act. Hector and Hal are apparently long time acquaintances that have been vying for the affections of Carol Ferris, but rather than showing this naturally, they just smack the audience with a rather literal scene in which Carol is just as surprised as the audience is to become aware of this fact. The government scoops up crashed alien ship, but they don't go looking for the flying man with glowing green skin? Clearly it is more convenient to drop the government inquiry subplot, and just chuck more crap at the audience until the plot just becomes muddled.
4) Parallax Nerf: Abin Sur, the "greatest warrior of the Green Lantern Corps", jobs to Parallax. Sinestro, second most powerful, takes a bunch of other powerful Lanterns and they job to Parallax. Hal goes up against a Parallax that has taken in more power, and manages to defeat him on a first go, even though Hal jobbed to Hector Hammond? Worse, Parallax jobs to Hal in a solo battle. Just because Thor got back his godhood and wrecked the Destroyer's ****, doesn't mean that noob Hal can just do whatever he wants. He had no experience, bland constructs and a clear confidence issue throughout the entire film. Yet I am to believe that Hal can defeat a foe so powerful that the Guardians thought that the Lantern Corps, filled with THOUSANDS of Lanterns, would lose in a fight.
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There are plenty of other issues, but I don't want to turn this post into a pseudo blog. I expect this film to have a fantastic opening weekend, because it is a new super hero film, but the drop off should be pretty steep. If the budget were more reasonable ($150 million seems to be the standard for super hero films), this would easily be a profitable venture. However, with the inflated $300 million budget, I expect Green Lantern to be the "Superman Returns" of this summer. The greatest failing of this venture is that Warner Bros. already had a well crafted blue print to follow. Green Lantern: First Flight was not only an impressive animation, it was an amazing adaption of the Green Lantern mythos. It handled the origin story in a believable manner. It had a fantastic sense of exploration and growth. I am not suggesting that Warner Bros. should have just made a live action conversion of First Flight, but they should have opted for a script that uses a similar structure/narrative.
