(Note: You will see I don’t give this film a very good review. I will tell you that my 15-year-old grandson absolutely loved it, as will most of his peers. Early teens up to young millennials will drive the box office on this one through the roof. (Those of us with more “stately” minds will find this a little “too much.”)
I dug deep, did tons of research, called around, and finally determined that the five people who were involved in writing and creating this story were all in some sort of hallucinatory state as they put this together. What other answer could there be for the mind-bending trip this movie leads you on?
In June 2011 I wrote about the movie Green Lantern, a long lost super hero from the old comic book days. I quote from that review, “I cannot find one compelling reason to recommend this movie to you. I spent most of my time watching this trying to determine which was worse, the script, the cast or the acting. The script won out, with the other two close behind.” While admittedly Captain Marvel is light years ahead of Green Lantern, I can apply the same thought process. It’s an unmitigated disaster, as borne out by the disappointed folks around me in the sold out theater, most of whom gave it thumbs down.
Captain Marvel
Entertainment Rating: ★
Rating: PG-13; no profanity, lots of “comic book” action
Possible Oscar Nominations: Special Effects
The movie is two hours of special effects, with a story woven in here and there. It takes at least an hour or so into the movie to figure out what is going on, as the aforementioned “authors” chose to use flashbacks to lay out the foundation of the story, and did it in a manner that seemed intent on confusing the viewer, and believe me they were successful.
Brie Larson stars as Carol Danvers, a very confused Earthling, suffering from amnesia as she finds herself on another planet in a distant solar system. The interplanetary adventures she is involved in eventually lead to her transformation into Captain Marvel, and as you watch you’re not really sure how that happens. Her metamorphosis isn’t complete until the last ten minutes or so of the movie, and by then you don’t really care. (At least I didn’t) In all fairness, Brie Larson does a yeoman-like job working her way through this script; her supporting cast includes Jude Law and you guessed it, Samuel L. Jackson. He seems to be in every super hero movie that comes around the corner, usually wearing an eye patch, which he doesn’t in this one until the very last minute. (I purposely don’t carry a Capitol One credit card in my wallet, and you can probably guess why).
As I sat through the coming attractions, one after another looked terrible. There were however two that may be worth our time, one is Rocket Man, the story of Elton John, there could be some good music in that one. The other is Dumbo, a non-animated version of the Disney classic. It looks like that one might be fun.
