Today’s post begins with a fractal called Silver Swirl. I chose it because I will be reviewing Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer and I couldn’t find a better image.-
I was feeling some trepidation when I decided to see Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer. The first installment of the series made over 300 Million dollars worldwide even though it was, in my humble opinion at least, abysmal. The plot was badly contrived and the acting spotty. There was no chemistry between Reed Richards and Sue Storm while Johnny Storm and Ben Grimm managed to steal every scene they were in. About the only positive you could give the movie was the first-rate effects. In a rare happenstance the sequel was about a thousand times better than the original.
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Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer suffers from many of the same problems that plagued the first movie. Ioan Gruffudd is still too young to play Mr. Fantastic convincingly and he fails to show an ounce of charisma throughout most of the movie. Jessica Alba continues to be little more than a great looking hanger for the spandex costume she wears. Much as I would like to believe otherwise, I am never convinced these two would hook up if they really excisted. Michael Chiklis was born to play Ben Grimm and handsome muscle-boy Chris Evens is suitably self-involved as party boy Johnny Storm. (His character is about as shallow as a kiddie pool and I never quite buy his as the secretly lonely loser the movie says he is inside.) Julian MacMahon gets resurrected (literally) from the dead to play Victor vcn Doom and then is given short shrift as the movie’s villain. New character the Silver Surfer is embodied by Doug Jones and voiced by Laurence Fishburn. The whole creation is a CGI wonder and he avoids the worst of the "Stan Lee" dialog. He is the single best reason to see the movie.
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The story begins with a mysterious silver meteor appearing in various locations on Earth and causing havoc. Meanwhile in New York City Reed Richards is trying for the fourth time to wed fiance Sue Storm (although what happened to stop weddings one, two and three are never explained) when Reed is approached by General Hager (Andre Braugher). He and Reed have had their disagreements in the past in the past but the General still needs his help. Reed refuses (citing his upcoming wedding) but he ends up working on a device to locate the anomaly plaguing the planet. When the anomaly (Silver Surfer) disrupts Reed and Sue’s wedding (in classic comic book style). Thus the group finally agrees to help.
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The FF have their first “real” encounter with the Silver Surfer at the “London Eye” (a gigantic Ferris Wheel built in honor of the Millenium) and Johnny finds he switches powers with the rest of the group every time he touches them. (This lends some much-needed hilarity to the movie and ultimate ends up being the ultimate solution to the problem.) After the attempt to capture the Surfer fails General Hagen brings in Victor von Doom to help (although why he chooses such a course of action remains unexplained) and the Silver Surfer is captured. Von Doom shows his true colors and steals the Surfer’s board--and claiming all the vast powers for himself--leaving the FF to free the Silver Surfer, defeat the bad guy and save the Earth.
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Although this movie has a lot of shortcomings, fans of super-sized battles on screen won’t be disappointed. I don’t think any but the most die-hard fans of the Fantastic Four will be disappointed either: this movie, more than just about any other I’ve seen tries hard to show what it would be like to be a super hero in the “real” world--one of its greatest charms. It was good to see the costumers have toned-down Mr. Fantastic's "white sidewalls"--which looked so completely fake and awful in the first installment. I could have done without the lame product placement: the one for Dodge is truly cringe-worthy. (The whole scene with the Fantasti-Car is truly pointless but fun to watch.) Still, there are enough “fun” bits to allow you to park your brain at the door and have a good popcorn-munching time.
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FINAL GRADE B-
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