Movie Review- “WONDER WOMAN” 2017
Move over Scarlett Johansen, Gal Gadot is the new top Super Hero of the Silver Screen. Her physical portrayal was spot-on as Diana of Themyscira…just perfect. The movie though…ugh…it was tedious at 140 minutes and wrapped up with such a convoluted third act that I walked out disappointed despite her awesome portrayal of the Comic Book Heroine. I wanted to love this film, but if Hollywood is going to set a superhero movie in a real historic period, like WWI, they can’t just completely re-write history by making the whole war a creation by a fallen Greek God (Ares) and expect the drag the audience along with them. This stupid premise supersedes the premise of pretty much all other Superhero movies, that mankind is exceptionally good if not for the interference of the Greek God of War. With the ending of the final act…there seemingly is no need to ever make another movie or tell another story, every super hero might as well just retire….Diana just destroyed all the evil in the world.
The opening scene, which features an all-female cast of “Amazons” in combat training camp seems to drag on a little too long to the point it was almost insulting. At one point I wanted to yell at the screen…”Yes, we get it, Women can be badasses…you don’t have to beat us over the head with it because it makes you writers look like YOU don’t actually believe it”. There is power is subtlety. During the first act, when Diana’s aunt is killed by Germans, she emotes like anyone losing a beloved family member, but the writers seemingly forgot that scene when Diana supposedly discovers the concept of “love” in the final act. It just didn’t make sense.
Certainly, the trenches battle scene was epic and the highlight of the film…Wonder Woman is truly a badass fighter, but the new added third-act-only super powers of flight (or near flight) and shooting atomic beams seemed like an after-thought from the writers. One of the classic attributes of Wonder Woman is that in addition to being tough, she was also super smart and intuitive. The writers put her in so many bumbling scenes where she was made to look stupid, it kept taking me out of the film, wondering why they would write a script making it look like this smart person couldn’t even figure out what clothing was supposed to do, even as she is surrounded by women wearing he same exact clothing. They put her in situations where she was so hell-bent on her “mission” that she was stupidly unaware of her surroundings. That wasn’t the Wonder Woman I know.
My hope is that due to the success of this film, we will get a few more from this franchise…and they will bring in some more talented storytellers to flesh out this otherwise very compelling and well portrayed character. Gal Gadot was a great choice to bring this character to life.
I am going to rate this film at a 3 out of 5 stars.
