Movie Breakdown: Aquaman (Noah)
Pre-Screening Stance:
I don’t know, DC has made some of the worst films of the last 100 years in the last decade and James Wan is a lunatic who drove a fast car between the two high rises in Dubai. Throw in hulking lump Jason Mamoa and an anime Barbie version of Amber Heard and well, who the fuck knows.
Post-Screening Ramble:
You’ll want to like Aquaman. Honestly, you will. You’ll want to sit in a dark theater with giant drum playing octopuses and Patrick Wilson yelling (and yelling and yelling and yelling) and Nicole Kidman beating the shit out of water-mask warriors and you’ll want to just absorb the sheer batshit insanity of James Wan’s newest big budget spectacle and feel good about it. And maybe it’s pity, or maybe you’re still in an extended period of celebration after James Wan’s last Fast and Furious film, or maybe you’re just trying to rationalize the squishy feeling in your stomach from seeing just how many stomach muscles Jason Mamoa has, but regardless the reason (lightness in dark times?), Aquaman – shaggy and bloated as it is – is a film you’ll want to like. It’s really up to your ability to bear the ludicrous nature of a film about a fish king in denial and his reticent quest to find a trident to stop his recently discovered half-brother from overthrowing the “surface world” that takes him and his seemingly outfitted by a k-pop music video hair and makeup department Amber Heard all across the world (and the sea). Because, this is, by any reasonable margin, a big, very dumb, badly acted film that dips its finned toes into the tide pools of so many styles of movies. It starts with Game of Thrones, stumbles into Indiana Jones, quickly dabbles in a sort of live-action Disney meets Mamma Mia cute scene, before jumping back into Indiana Jones on the way to a Game of Thrones season finale with all of it liberally sprinkled with buddy comedy quips and emotional cues from far better movies. It is, undoubtedly, a lot to handle. And, if anything, James Wan does an admirable job of moving everything along at a fast enough clip that right as you’re saying to yourself “Did the Atlantean princess just eat a rose?” you’re all of sudden in a video game where Black Mantis (Yahya Abdul-Mateen II) is firing lasers from his head while every roof in Sicily is fallen through. A film like this (an enormous, stupid one) needs strong central characters and though Jason Mamoa’s Arthur Curry and Amber Heard’s Mera look the parts (outside of Mera’s Raggedy Anne wig choice) the chemistry between the two is non-existent, mainly because neither actor can muster a single drop of enthusiasm. Instead Mamoa mumbles his way through a poor-man’s imitation of Han Solo, with Heard’s performance defines both the terms “stilted” and “uppity.” You got to give it James Wan though, he took a big swing at a seemingly unfilmable property, diving deep into the weirdness of Aquaman’s world. It doesn’t work, but you’ll be so busy trying to find purchase as the movie hurtles along, you might not notice.
One Last Thought:
I want a definitive ranking of all the older, famous actors who’ve now appeared in super hero movies as grizzled mentors. Kidman’s Atlanna is like the grandmother of underwater Burning Man, and it’s pretty rad.
One More Last Thought:
It’s pretty awesome that Arthur Curry’s dad (Temuera Morrison) is just a total sad, drunk and no one ever acknowledges it. This is a character that is clearly sending out signals for help and his son, the fucking KING of Atlantis just takes him to the bar for breakfast and gets him wasted. Cool.
