Of Hancock

Finally a movie I can actually be cruel to. Soon I get to have a go at Heroes. However if you look at my movie reviews I've been stunningly positive to almost all of them (I think the only one below a seven is Shoot 'em Up). I genuinely didn't like Hancock. No offense if you did but if you think it's a better superhero movie than Iron-Man or Dark Knight you are a complete and utter fool. It is nowhere near as good as either of those films.

For starters it genuinely needs to decide on a tone. Seriously you'd think a movie starring Will Smith and Jason Bateman would be funny, which it is don't get me wrong, but I thought it'd be funnier. Yes Will Smith has done drama. He has also done drama stunningly well. I mean in 2006 he was in Pursuit of Happyness which is a genuinely touching movie. In this I honestly don't know what the fuck he was doing. One second he's a drunk the next minute we're supposed to feel sorry for him. Hancock was a dick throughout the first half of the movie, this was also the best bit of the movie. Then he finally manages to get rid of his dick persona, in an admittedly quite a cool scene. However then the movie goes to the shit. There are some incredible lapses of logic. Far more than The Dark Knight. Hancock starts to slowly lose his powers when he meets a fellow superhero. Then all of a sudden being a reasonable distance away means he can get them back. It isn't a slow process like the other it just happens. This happens in what is supposed to be the emotional climax of the film which in effect is just truly mindbogglingly stupid.

Another complaint. There is no clear villain. If anything true love is painted to be a villain in this film. Apparently the two people who are made for each other should never get together. Instead the woman should cheat on her husband with a normal man who is eventually going to die of natural causes whilst you carry on living. Congratulations you've managed to fuck up your relationship entirely. Back to my villain complaint. What we get in place of a villain is a man who wants revenge for having his hand chopped up. Apparently he was a veteran of the war and now wants monetary compensation. Fair enough. However despite being soldiers they try to kill fucking everyone in the bank and most of the Los Angeles police force. So they go away and fight for all these people but then try to murder them all. In fact not only that but that but they try to shoot an injured female police officer and the man who is trying to save her. Then the other two villains are even worse. The only reason they want to get Hancock is because he shoved one their heads up the others arse. Great. So what I thought was a reasonably funny throw away gag turns into a plot point? Lord give me strength.

The special effects in this film seem to flit between "actually quite decent" and "no don't do that again". It just seems in some parts that they wanted to say "look we have an amazing budget" and throw in a completely fucking pointless storm. The flying scenes are obviously green screen and not the cool screen like in Superman where it looks good. Nope it just looks bad. I can appreciate stuff like the train scene or throwing the whale (the movies funniest scene annoyingly spoiled by the trailer). However when you're flying scenes look like Heroes you need to have a slapped wrist.

More complaints!!! The last half of the movie falls into pointless melodrama. If they'd carried on the tone of the first half it could have been a decent movie. Instead it decides to throw us a half decent twist then shit all over the last half of the movie. Honestly I hated that last half of the movie. There's just the fact that it destroyed the tone of the first half. The humour is gone. Which isn't all bad. There are many which can combine humour and drama in a great way (Garden State) but Hancock is either one or the other. Seriously if the people who made Hancock ever read this (HA!) go watch Iron-Man. That movie manages to combine comedy and drama in a great way. This movie could have so easily be great because it's trying to do something original but it fails. In fact Iron-Man is eventually going to have to hit upon the "alcoholic" storyline and I know it's going to be a million times better than this turned out. Hancock has some stunning story issues. I just can't get past them.

Okay time for something reasonably positive. I like all three of the main characters. Will Smith? Great actor. Pursuit of Happyness, Ali and even some of I am Legend. He's shown he can be funny in Men in Black and was the lead in a sitcom in the 90s. However if you ask me they got him mixed up with Tommy Lee Jones because he seems to be gruff in this instead of the sort of comedy that Will Smith can do. In fact the movie is funny. Almost all the scenes Will Smith has with Jason Bateman (Arrested Development) are actually pretty funny. I like both of these actors however I feel stunningly bad for Charlize Theron the OSCAR WINNING actress in an amazingly underwritten role in what can only be described as the antagonist of the film. At least Dark Knight made good use of the their talent with Heath Ledger.

Alright I will say I laughed at certain points. The first half is alright. However the twist that happens destroys the movie. The movie really needed a distinct tone or at least work at making it a good dramedy. With talent like Will Smith and Jason Bateman you'll be excused for thinkig "oooh funniness" and yes there are laughs but not nearly enough. For a good example of how to do a superhero movie for featuring a bit of dick watch Iron-Man, because knowing what I know about the Iron-Man character he only gets a lot more like Hancock. Hancock seems to be a failed experiment. They really dropped the ball on the last half of the movie. Hopefully they can sort out in the second movie (if not I'm only going to review it worse than this one). 5/10