🐖 Review Film Fantastic Four

Thefour of them acquire special powers, and decide to form a superhero group called the Fantastic Four. They then fight their arch-enemy Dr. Doom. REVIEW: Produced under the wing of B-movie maven Roger Corman, 1994's "The Fantastic Four" attempt would fulfill the realization of seeing the team come to life for the first time in this TV Thescript is dull, littered with clichéd catchphrases and humorless. There are barely any action scenes in the film, save the film's climax, which looks rushed. Read More Cast & Crew Josh Trank Director Miles Teller Actor Kate Mara Actor Jamie Bell Actor Toby Kebbell Actor Fantastic Four Movie Review Times Of India Thisfilm was atrocious. I can't believe how much they dropped the ball on this one Let me explain the positives/negatives. Positives: 1. The scene with Reed and Ben as kids was handled okay. 2. FantasticFour isn't unwatchable or flat-out awful. It's aggressively mundane, and devoid of energy, wonder, wit and whimsy. For a movie about people seeking what else is out there, Fantastic Four InFantastic Four, when our heroes, now transformed, return from Planet Zero, they really are bummed, a quality the movie expresses through the human scale of its special effects. Trank, who made Tweet S o appallingly dull that even a third-act parade of exploding heads can't rouse interest, Fantastic Four may be the most minor Marvel Comics film yet. And at this dispiritingly late date, that's saying something indeed. It also adds more grist for the mill to the notion that studios don't hit the big red "reboot" button in any FantasticFour. This week's films. Reviews in chronological order (Total 8 reviews) A Story of Children and Film review â Mark Cousins's 'spine-tingling' visual essay. More film reviews Its as if somebody took two pretty-decent feature length movies, broke them into pieces, and re-edited them into one film, but without any discernible plan beyond "get this down to 90 minutes." This is not a shortness issue, though. It's an everything issue. I'm not convinced that the movie's problems could have been solved with more scenes. 1m8I. Johnny Storm, the Human Torch Chris Evans flames out in "Fantastic Four," wondering what it would be like to shake hands with Aquaman. So you get in a spaceship, and you venture into orbit to research a mysterious star storm hurtling toward Earth. There's a theory it may involve properties of use to man. The spaceship is equipped with a shield to protect its passengers from harmful effects, but the storm arrives ahead of schedule and saturates everybody on board with unexplained but powerful energy that creates radical molecular changes in their return safety to Earth, only to discover that Reed Richards Ioan Gruffudd, the leader of the group, has a body that can take any form or stretch to unimaginable lengths. Call him Mr. Fantastic. Ben Grimm Michael Chiklis develops superhuman powers in a vast and bulky body that seems made of stone. Call him the Thing. Sue Storm Jessica Alba can become invisible at will and generate force fields that can contain propane explosions, in case you have a propane explosion that needs containing but want the option of being invisible. Call her Invisible Woman. And her brother Johnny Storm Chris Evans has a body that can burn at supernova temperatures. Call him the Human Torch. I almost forgot the villain, Victor Von Doom Julian McMahon, who becomes Dr. Doom and wants to use the properties of the star storm and the powers of the Fantastic Four for his own purposes. He eventually becomes this point in the review, are you growing a little restless? What am I gonna do, list names and actors and superpowers and nicknames forever? That's how the movie all setup and demonstration, and naming and discussing and demonstrating, and it never digests the complications of the Fantastic Four and gets on to telling a compelling story. Sure, there's a nice sequence where the Thing keeps a fire truck from falling off a bridge, but you see one fire truck saved from falling off a bridge, you've seen them Fantastic Four are, in short, underwhelming. The edges kind of blur between them and other superhero teams. That's understandable. How many people could pass a test right now on who the X-Men are and what their powers are? Or would want to? I wasn't watching "Fantastic Four" to study it, but to be entertained by it, but how could I be amazed by a movie that makes its own characters so indifferent about themselves?The Human Torch, to repeat, can burn at supernova temperatures! He can become so hot, indeed, that he could threaten the very existence of the Earth itself! This is absolutely stupendously amazing, wouldn't you agree? If you could burn at supernova temperatures, would you be able to stop talking about it? I know people who won't shut up about winning 50 bucks in the after Johnny Storm finds out he has become the Human Torch, he takes it pretty much in stride, showing off a little by setting his thumb on fire. Later he saves the Earth, while Invisible Woman simultaneously contains his supernova so he doesn't destroy it. That means Invisible Woman could maybe create a force field to contain the sun, which would be a big deal, but she's too distracted to explore the possibilities; she gets uptight because she will have to be naked to be invisible, because otherwise people could see her empty clothes; it is no consolation to her that invisible nudity is more of a metaphysical concept than a condition. Are these people complete idiots? The entire nature of their existence has radically changed, and they're about as excited as if they got a makeover on "Oprah." The exception is Ben Grimm, as the Thing, who gets depressed when he looks in the mirror. Unlike the others, who look normal except when actually exhibiting superpowers, he looks like - well, he looks like his suits would fit The Hulk, just as the Human Torch looks like The Flash, and the Invisible Woman reminds me of Storm in "X-Men."Is this the road company? Thing clomps around on his Size 18 boulders and feels like an outcast until he meets a blind woman named Alicia Kerry Washington who loves him, in part because she can't see him. But the Thing looks like Don Rickles crossed with Mt. Rushmore; he has a body that feels like a driveway and a face with crevices you could hide a toothbrush in. Alicia tenderly feels his face with her fingers, like blind people often do while falling in love in the movies, and I guess she likes what she feels. Maybe she's story involves Dr. Doom's plot to ... but perhaps we need not concern ourselves with the plot of the movie, since it is undermined at every moment by the unwieldy need to involve a screenful of characters, who, despite the most astonishing powers, have not been made exciting or even interesting. The X-Men are major league compared to the really good superhero movies, like "Superman," "SpiderMan 2" and "Batman Begins," leave "Fantastic Four" so far behind that the movie should almost be ashamed to show itself in the same theaters. Roger Ebert Roger Ebert was the film critic of the Chicago Sun-Times from 1967 until his death in 2013. In 1975, he won the Pulitzer Prize for distinguished criticism. Now playing Film Credits Fantastic Four 2005 Rated PG-13 for sequences of intense action and some suggestive content 106 minutes Latest blog posts about 8 hours ago about 11 hours ago about 12 hours ago 1 day ago Comments A Lot or a Little? What you will—and won't—find in this movie. What's the Story? In this film version of the Marvel comic FANTASTIC FOUR, egotistical Victor Von Doom Julian McMahon finances a mission into outer space in which four of his employees are zapped by a radioactive cloud that alters their DNA according to their sense of self. Romantically wishy-washy Reed Ioan Gruffudd turns elastic, his feeling-ignored girlfriend Susan Jessica Alba turns invisible, her hotheaded brother Johnny Chris Evans becomes the "human torch," and Reed's best friend and enforcer, Ben Michael Chiklis, gets stony. Von Doom is also zapped, and his body slowly changes to a human-metallic alloy. When he loses control of his billion-dollar corporation, he decides to take his revenge on The Fantastic Four. He sets out to eliminate them one by one, beginning, so he thinks, with the emotionally insecure and physically unstoppable Ben. Talk to Your Kids About ... Families can talk about how superpowers change the characters' lives in Fantastic Four, as they must decide how to use them, for public good, for personal gain, or to settle personal grudges. How are anxieties, competitions, and quarrels exacerbated by these changes? How is Susan's situation different from the men's, as she feels the need to mediate their arguments? How do the four friends learn to appreciate their differences as well as their similar situations, as "freaks," celebrities, and heroes? What is the appeal of superhero movies? How does this one compare? Movie Details In theaters July 8, 2005 On DVD or streaming December 6, 2005 Cast Chris Evans, Ioan Gruffudd, Jessica Alba, Michael Chiklis Director Tim Story Inclusion Information Black directors, Latinx actors Studio Twentieth Century Fox Genre Action/Adventure Topics Superheroes Run time 105 minutes MPAA rating PG-13 MPAA explanation sequences of intense action, and some suggestive content Last updated February 17, 2023 Inclusion information powered by Fantastic Four feels like a 100-minute trailer for a movie that never happens. At this point in the ever-expanding cinematic superhero game, it behooves any filmmakers who gets involved to have at least a mildly fresh take on their characters and material, but this third attempt to create a worthy cinematic franchise from the first of Stan Lee and Jack Kirbys iconic comic book creations, which can genuinely claim to have launched the Age of Marvel, proves maddeningly lame and unimaginative. Die-hard fans will undoubtedly show up, but box-office results for this Fox release will fall far short of what Marvel achieves with its own in-house productions. The stakes are much higher now than when other hands grappled with these characters in the past. A 1994 feature produced by Bernd Eichinger and Roger Corman and directed by Oley Sassone was so cheesy that it never officially saw the light of day, while the two films directed by Tim Story in 2005 and 2007 did well enough but are remembered, if at all, for Jessica Alba. The Bottom Line More like the Unfantastic Four. This time, the reins have been handed to director and co-writer Josh Trank, whose one previous feature was the 2012 “found-footage” thriller Chronicle. Unfortunately, there is no youthful enthusiasm or sense of reinvention evident in this outing. Nothing that Trank and his co-writers Jeremy Slater and Simon Kinberg have come up with does anything to alleviate the feeling that the titular quartet simply don’t constitute very interesting superheroes. Oyster Bay school kid Reed Richards is introduced as a nerdy genius who has essentially built a teleporter in his home out of common equipment, a “bio-matter shuttle” that can transport matter through space. Helping him procure parts is tough-guy neighbor Ben Grimm. Read more Remembering the First Fantastic Four’ Movie No, Not That One His science teacher never appreciates him, but seven years later Reed Miles Teller, slumming for the first time in his sterling young career receives foundation backing to perfect his creation. One waits patiently as more exposition is laid out and further characters are shuffled in There’s deep-voiced project overseer Dr. Franklin Storm Reg E. Cathey, his car-happy son, Johnny Michael B. Jordan, who looks like he’d be happier in a Fast & Furious installment; Storm’s adopted daughter, Sue Kate Mara, a master technician who spends most of her time in front of a screen; grown-up Ben Jamie Bell; moody malcontent science genius Victor Von Doom Toby Kebbell; and agency boss Dr. Allen Tim Blake Nelson, who backs the construction of a machine designed to zap them all to another dimension and allows a multimanned mission after just one test run involving a chimpanzee. The chimp, in fact, comes back in fine shape, but no such luck for the human pioneers, who make it to a barren, rocky land of unknown location or identity, plant the flag, and are subsequently engulfed by a green energy field that gives them all strange powers — or at least distinct new characteristics Reed develops elastic, ever-stretchable limbs, and Johnny can turn into a flaming meteor, so count them lucky compared to Ben, whose new rocky body mass makes him a cousin of the Hulk with a more mottled complexion. And then there’s Victor Von Doom, who must live up to his name by going over to the dark side. Sue is forced to stay home and must ultimately move among the other characters in a large, transparent bubble straight out of The Wizard of Oz. All of this takes at least an hour, and it’s build-up to …nothing at all. A sense of heaviness, gloom and complete disappointment settles in during the second half, as the mundane setup pays no dramatic or sensory dividends whatsoever. Even if lip-service is paid to some great threat to life on Earth as we know it, the filmmakers bring nothing new to the formula, resulting in a film that’s all wind-up and no delivery. The fact that the writers couldn’t think of anything interesting to do with these characters in this first series reboot does not bode well for any potential excitement in a sequel. Read more Fantastic Four’ The Most Marvel Superheroes of All Beginning with Teller and Jordan, who have done such promising early work, the cast is utterly wasted here with mostly rote explanatory dialogue and little conflict or nuance to work on a dramatic level. And the visual style is in a dark, unattractive, gloomy mode that infects every aspect of the film. Near the end, Teller’s Reed comments on the status of the group’s actions by proclaiming, “We opened this door, we’re gonna close it.” The sooner the better. Production Marv Films, Kinberg Genre, Robert Kulzer Productions Cast Miles Teller, Michael B. Jordan, Kate Mara, Jamie Bell, Toby Kebbell, Reg E. Cathey, Tim Blake Nelson, Tim Heidecker Director Josh Trank Screenwriters Jeremy Slater, Simon Kinberg, Josh Trank Producers Simon Kinberg, Matthew Vaughn, Hutch Parker, Robert Kulzer, Gregory Goodman Executive producer Stan Lee Director of photography Matthew Jensen Production designer Chris Seagers Costume designer George L. Little Editors Elliot Greenberg, Stephen Rivkin Music Marco Beltrami, Philip Glass Visual effects supervisor James E Price Casting Ronna Kress Rated PG-13, 100 minutes

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