Another week, another origin movie. How can this be? Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man (2002) launched this comic craze a full 15 years ago. Why, then, are we still suffering through origin films? Shouldn’t we have made our way through all of these by now? And as if to answer that question, Spider-Man will again origin himself (for the third time in those 15 years) next month.
How tired am I of origin films…?
Even though the hidden island of Themyscira is populated with smokin’ hot Amazon honeys who look like Robin Wright and Connie Nielson, something in me broke about 5 minutes in when Queen Hippolyta (Nielsen) started to explain all the originey stuff to the little girl who will eventually montage into Diana Prince aka Wonder Woman aka Gal Gadot. Yep, somewhere in that middle of all that soul-killing gibberish about Zeus and a god of war and a prophecy and a destiny, my soul screamed out to no one in particular, OH MY DEAR GAWD NOT THIS SH*T AGAIN!
Because it is her destiny, eventually Chris Pine shows up to befriend Diana, point her to her destiny, and bring her to meet her destiny in WWI-era London. You know, because destiny.
Wonder Woman has its moments, almost all of them delivered by Gadot, who is perfect in the role. Hollywood is buried in strikingly beautiful 32-year-old women. Gadot, however, is unquestionably special beyond her otherworld allure. Her Wonder Woman is both naïve and fierce, sweet and tough, innocent and a warrior. The references to Christopher Reeve’s Superman are apt — our heroine personifies a basic sense of uncomplicated decency and humanity, and wraps it all in superhero steel.
Gadot’s performance is the whole show. You never catch her acting and her movie star-charisma, her beauty (which is meticulously captured in every shot), her beguiling charm, and talent, are all reminiscent of an Audrey Hepburn or Grace Kelly, something I do not say lightly. Too many female action heroes work entirely too hard to act like men. Gadot’s super-heroine is certainly a bad-ass. Thankfully, she is also always feminine; a classy and dignified woman.
Wonder Woman has a few big problems. 1) At 141 minutes, it is easily a half-hour too long. 2) The story never takes off. There is no, “Okay, here we go!” moment. That crucial beat of superhero ecstasy where Superman saves Lois in that helicopter, where Iron Man takes out the jihadists terrorizing that village, where the Joker and Batman duke it out on the streets of Chicago — it never arrives. 3) Yet another soulless, lumbering, CGI-filled, “epic” finale that makes you feel as though you are watching someone else play a video game.
Except for a few action sequences (that I have already forgotten), my experience was mostly waiting for the bloated story to get to it. Another problem is that the villains, German General Erich Ludendorff (Danny Huston) and his chemist sidekick Dr. Poison (Elena Anaya), never feel like a real threat. They pop in and out of the story to spout exposition and the single scene where Ludendorff and Diana meet (they dance together) is beyond absurd, like a bad parody of a James Bond movie.
Movie stars matter, though, and Gadot has that indefinable *it* quality in spades. For its part, between Gadot’s Wonder Woman and Margot Robbie’s Harley Quinn, as far as the appeal of the female members of these respective franchises, the DC universe can at least claim one big victory in its death match against Marvel.
The nicest thing I can say about Wonder Woman is the nicest thing I could say about Batman vs. Superman: Gadot is by far the best thing in it, and if she is ever given the movie she deserves, that movie will be something very special.
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