Screenscenes

“Daredevil” Starring Ben Affleck, Jennifer
Garner Directed by Mark Steven Johnson

Comic fans will once again unite Friday as
“Daredevil” is unleashed upon the masses. While
it’s not quite as good as “the world’s first
flaming billboard” on Sunset Boulevard promises, there is
plenty of heart and soul to this story of justice and revenge in
Hell’s Kitchen. “Daredevil” introduces us to Matt
Murdock, lawyer by day, super-sensory badass by night.
Daredevil’s main points of intrigue are his flaws: he’s
blind, he gets hurt and he feels guilty about his actions.
He’s far more human than most other high-flying heroes.
Unfortunately, Ben Affleck as the big red devil falls a bit short.
He strolls through this material with nonchalance, doing little
more than applying opaque contacts to access the otherwise
intriguing psyche of Murdock, and has minimal chemistry with
Elektra (Garner). Affleck’s just being Affleck, not the
“Man Without Fear”; he suffers from the Tom Cruise
syndrome. The most successful performance here is Colin
Farrell’s, dead on as maniacal target specialist Bullseye. He
finally makes good on his “next big thing” status,
tearing up the screen with his Irish brogue and cocksure swagger.
Also notable is Jon Favreau as “Foggy” Nelson, Matt
Murdock’s business partner and a welcome relief from the
surprisingly gory PG-13 violence. The movie has many of the
symptoms that have plagued other recent superhero film efforts: an
anonymous rock soundtrack; mediocre special effects, save for
Daredevil’s sonar-like “shadow vision”; and
messily cut fight sequences. But what puts “Daredevil”
above its counterparts is the excellent source material. The fights
are intimate, the heroes and villains are thoroughly illustrated,
and the pain and pleasure experienced is tangible. That’s
what make this film ultimately rewarding. –Paul
Mendoza

“Gerry” Starring Casey Affleck, Matt Damon
Directed by Gus Van Sant

Minimalism has occurred in art (Rothko, Warhol) and music
(Reich, Glass), and now a bunch of Hollywood folks are bringing
attention to the minimalist film a la Tsai Ming Liang and Aleksandr
Sokurov. “Gerry” has little plot, little dialogue, and
lots and lots of silence and beautiful cinematography in the barren
Mars-like desert where our characters have lost their way. This
film begs the question: why should I care? The answer depends on
who you are. If you like amazingly long tracking shots, if you like
to hear the random rhythmic patterns of feet hitting sand, if you
like observing characters like a mosquito on a rock, if you have
the attention span of the Grand Canyon, if you like to think
thoughts that are unpopular at parties, if you’re slightly
drugged and want something visually trippy, then
“Gerry” is a godsend. But the joys of this film are
purely technical and not very emotional. As it goes to the extreme,
the film doesn’t quite convince us that this extreme is
interesting, and the Sokurov-esque film doesn’t quite capture
the imagination as “Russian Ark” did. Go see that
instead. –Howard Ho

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