Zack Snyder's Justice League (2021) As someone with dwindling patience for comic book movies, we approached this gargantuan epic like a casual, unassuming pedestrian who came upon a 4 hour parade when all we wanted to do was cross the street.......
That means we'll not dive into the tortuous backstory behind this film, which first existed in a completely different version directed by Joss Whedon......(roundly dismissed and despised by hardcore fans of the DC comics universe.)
After being sidelined by a terrible family tragedy, writer-director Zack Snyder accomplished the unheard-of task of reclaiming the film, tossing out Whedon's footage and fashioning his own uncut 4 hour and 2 minute fully realized vision of it.
Which, thanks to the wondrous ability of a DVD to be paused for pee breaks, we watched in its endless entirety.......
Since just writing these opening paragraphs has already exhausted us, we'll stick to breaking it all down to random observations......like Al Roker and Savannah Guthrie do when they describe the floats and giant balloons in the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade.......
Overall impression.....kind of like watching all three of Marvel "Avengers" movies back to back, only with all the snarky byplay and jokes sucked out of them.......along with anything resembling a primary color in the cinematography.....Grim, dark depressing, but it does trot out all the usual interminable fights involving superheroes and supervillains flinging each other through the air........
Ben Affleck's Batman......we started to feel for him.....since ole Ben is the only one in this crew who's technically mortal (no sooper-dooper powers) and therefore completely dependent on his elaborate array of hardware.....(the batmobile, batjet, bat-tank, bat-whatever....)
Wonder Woman battling terrorists who want to bring back the middle ages......which led us to ponder, if these guys want to go back to the Dark Ages, why do they feel the need to wear business suits?
Superman back from the dead.......we'd no idea a stay in the afterlife leaves you seriously pissed off, Soopy looked so angry, you'd think he spent all his dead-time forced to watch perpetual reruns of the Emmy awards......
Aquaman's boozing...... we'll say this much for him.....for a superguy who takes a fair crack at the sauce at every opportunity. he stays in remarkably good shape. Must be the swimming.......
'The Flash'......the DC version of Tom Holland's dorky teen, quip spouting Spiderman, the closest this movie ever gets to comedy relief. But no comedy occurs here.....and it's only a relief when he shuts up.....
The old movie screen ratio of 1:33.......you'd have to ask Zack Snyder why he decided to render this expansive spectacle in a screen format that's about the same size and shape of your grandfather's 1954 Motorola TV......
The neverending endings.......here's where the length of "Justice League" finally began to work on our last nerve.......similar to the multiple wrap-ups of "The Return Of The King", the third 'Lord Of The Rings' movie, it drags on and on after the superheroes' climactic battle has finished.....(and that battle alone felt like it ate up an hour all by itself). By the time the end credits appeared, we clasped our hands in grateful thanks for deliverance........
Gravel-voiced CGI villains........Steppenwolf, that guy with horns.......didn't Tum Curry play him in "Legend" that Ridley Scott movie with Tom Cruise as a macho elf?
So how do we go about rating a behemoth like this? Simple......for fans of superheroes and their angst, the movie's a 4 star (****) all-you-can eat buffet.....a buffet piled high with junky fried food that's not good for you but you're helpless to resist.
For the rest of us? We're not sure attempting a civilian rating would do any good here, since the film was designed as the ultimate experience for the DC universe fan base.......and nobody else.
If you fall outside that demographic, proceed with extreme caution.......
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