Thursday, June 1, 2017

Film Review - Wonder Woman (2017)

Wonder Woman is the latest DC film following Batman V Superman and Suicide Squad and this one is directed by Patty Jenkins and tells the origins of Diana Prince (Gal Gadot reprising the role from BVS) and her upbringing on Theymiscera and her eventual journey to Man's World with Captain Steve Trevor (Chris Pine) where the Great War (World War 1) is being fought in its dying days.

I was pretty keen for this movie to come mainly because of the previews I saw for the film which looked terrific I loved the cast and the WW1 setting but while I had faith in Ms Jenkins and her team I had no real faith in DC who had made a complete mess of their new film universe with both BVS and Suicide Squad failing to deliver the goods, was this one bound to suffer the same fate.

Happily no as this is a very enjoyable film for three key reasons:

- First of all Jenkins direction is very good and though Zack Snyder's influence can be felt in some of the action sequences this is very clearly her film and she has a great skill in terms of keeping the story flowing well, getting good performances from her actors and not letting that big action get too out of hand and overwhelming the overall storytelling of the film.

- Secondly Gadot is really good here and it's very hard now to really imagine anyone else doing this role (and attempts were made in the past to make a WW film) she brings a real mix of naiveté, softness, warmth and heart to this role that made her very appealing in one scene in particular she reminded me of Princess Jasmine in Aladdin when she goes out into the Agrabah Marketplace for the first time a shame someone like her couldn't play Jasmine in the live action Aladdin film.

- And lastly Chris Pine is very good as Steve Trevor who is a great character I remember from the Justice League 3 parter "The Savage Time" and the chemistry between Pine and Gadot is very good in particular and watching him here in this role made me think that he could've been a great Jack Ryan the best after Alec Baldwin if they had just given him the right script and direction but alas that wasn't to be sadly.

Also sadly this film does go downhill somewhat in the third act in a very similar manner to BVS where a big baddie shows up, a big fight breaks out with lots of destruction and flying scenes and high energy punching and it got really boring rather quickly and when thinking about the film it did overshadow the really good work Jenkins put into this film and the villains actually not being all that bad certainly much better than most of the Marvel villains which have been so bland and boring you just completely forget about them.

And so that was Wonder Woman a fun superhero flick that will not be hard to enjoy despite some minor 3rd act flaws, 3 and a half out of 5.

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