Black Widow (July 9, 2021)

[Otomofan]

Yeah, that scene in Pulp Fiction is amazing. It's all on hand held camera, and no music. The way it's shot makes it feel more like documentary footage than a movie.

Of course, Tarantino can be cartoony as well, like in Django where a single bullet can blow someone across the room and entire water balloons of blood fly out. But the violence in that movie is supposed to be exagerrated and over the top, so we can feel the emotional catharsis Django feels when he finally gets revenge for the lifetime of horror he's been through. And I certainly hope kids as young as 8 never see that movie!

Anyone remember the movie "Grand Canyon," from like....1991? I thought that was another very well done shooting scene. Steve Martin's character gets shot in the leg or something and he immediately falls to the pavement and pisses himself. I thought that was incredibly realistic to show something like that; someone truly reacting to the intense terror you'd feel when you're actually shot.

 

[ZE_501]

Of course, Tarantino can be cartoony as well,

True, but as you point out, there's stylized and there's sanitized.

Anyone remember the movie "Grand Canyon," from like....1991? I thought that was another very well done shooting scene. Steve Martin's character gets shot in the leg or something and he immediately falls to the pavement and pisses himself. I thought that was incredibly realistic to show something like that; someone truly reacting to the intense terror you'd feel when you're actually shot.

Haven't seen it, but it makes sense. The body can do all kinds of weird things when traumatized.

I remember a hard sparring session years ago, I went down from something or other and must have hit a nerve in my arm. It was the strangest thing because not only did it incapacitate me for a few minutes but it actually made me nauseous, which was the last thing I expected. It went away but was a good lesson that nerves are funny things.

 

[Chakor]

Nothing will ever be good enough for them and it's honestly insulting that all mass media companies decided to throw their actual audiences under the bus to pander to a bunch of sexually frustrated, obsese female teens with no disposable income.

 

[guyver1]

What was with ..the unrealistic special effects in the action sequences ..Tash took so many dives off the building and see hit every conceivable object before she hit the ground and no marks on her ..just her expression of Owww

 

[ShadowX81]

So what exactly happened in the ending?

Spoiler

Last we saw, Black Widow was being approached by a convoy of American agents including General Ross ready to arrest her for violation of the Sarkovia Accords, with Natasha standing there seemingly ready to accept her fate. Suddenly it just cuts to her on her friend's runway where he is giving her a quintet.

 

[jye4ever]

Why is the director that was hand picked by executive producer Scarjo nowhere to be seen in the press tour.

 

[loki2371]

This movie really sounds more and more like a mess and a pointless train wreck.

That only the diehard can do no wrong MCU Fanboys will drool over... And maybe the woke SJW/LGBTQ only fans will praise. Surprised we haven't seen articles that Widow and the other chick are actually in love. Like we had to deal with Cap Mavel and her friend, and Bucky & Sam. LGBTQ fans longing for something that isn't actually there.

The "twist" ending sounds so dumb. Not only does it ruin an established character, but it somewhat even takes away from the intended "girl power" message (girls strong and smart, boys weak willed and dumb). And worse of all, It's even not remotely new & cool anymore when it's already been done. Especially when used in a movie owned by the same studio that failed miserably.

The more I read the less I think I ever want to watch this. Even when free on D+.

 

[matticus]

Jack Sparrow let me embark on the journey to BW. Man, knew I would hate this movie. Nothing I want more in a Marvel movie than to hear about periods, fallopian tubes, etc. Little too on the nose for a Marvel movie? Action was good, but the freefall part lacked any logic. I just skipped the heavy exposition, but unfortunately ran into a ton of dumb, trying to hard comedy. All the characters were pretty forgettable to me. No lesbian action at all, the letter clan should be outright protesting this movie.

 

[nexus]

While I'll only give it a 6.5/10 or (B-), still glad it was made. ScarJo/Black Widow deserved her own movie, it's just too bad it wasn't better.

There were some good ideas that could have made for a much, much better international political thriller-style superhero movie, but the story lacked any real intrigue, a muddled scheme, and ended up being clunky and predictable. I do give them credit for giving Nat an interesting backstory (the opening sequence was quite strong) but it ended up looking more like a mid-budget action movie instead of a Marvel level Blockbuster. I'm so friggin' tired of echo chamber trolls whining about "SJW agendas" every second sentence. The problem with this movie was a half cooked script and a director that was clearly in over her head.

Other random musings (I'll just spoiler tag the lot)

Spoiler

• ]Taskmaster was the absolute worst reveal since the Mandarin. I saw the twist coming 15 minutes in and kept hoping I was wrong. Of course Dreykov's daughter is alive because it then means Natasha didn't kill a kid.
• Initially, I thought Taskmaster might end up being her procurement guy, Mason. He could have been playing both sides and the middle, which works for international thrillers, and would make him interesting. But his character was so under developed I marked that off pretty quickly. The actors actually had good chemistry in the first scene, but then he disappeared and the writing just kind of trailed off.
• So Dreykov comes out of the explosion without a scratch while his daughter gets half her face burned off? Of course maybe he was never in the room, which seems like a pretty big goose egg to overlook for one of the world's top super spies. Had he also been horribly scarred and maybe missing a limb or confined to a hi-tech wheelchair that pumped him with drugs to manage his pain and keep him alive, that would have better explained why he stayed out of sight. He could also been written to be more twisted and ruthless. Maybe his master scheme could have been to simultaneously activate all of the embedded Widows worldwide to carry out mass assassinations and acts of sabotage in order to destabilize the global political and economic systems. Then take advantage of the chaos seize power. That is more of a high-stakes geopolitical scheme (there could have been quick scenes of Widows embedded at the White House, Kremlin, Buckingham Palace, etc. as well as a countdown clock to the order being executed). This was a five-year plan and he would have been positioned as a master strategist.
• What was Drekov's rank and position anyway? They kept that pretty muddy, and no mention of Putin. Also man had the resources to build a flying base? Was it supposed to be stolen S.H.I.E.L.D tech? It probably would have made more sense to make him one of the heads of HYDRA.
• Antonia's head looked weird atop the Taskmaster armor. I don't have a problem with gender swaps when they make sense, but in this case I don't think it did. There were other ways Antonia could have been kept alive. Heck, she could have even been the big bad ultimately pulling Dreykov's strings, which would have made her a lot more compelling of a character.
• All of the fight scenes were pretty underwhelming. I don't know if it was poor choreography, bad direction, or bad editing, but this is an area where the movie should have shined with John Wick-level fights, but instead looked like any other generic actioner.
• I thought Pugh did a very good job, but she didn't outshine Scarlett as some folks are saying. They were well balanced and had great chemistry. The hero landing/posing was a funny bit.
• Weisz looked great and I thought she was convincing playing a scientist and spy.
• While Harbour was well cast, he was really under served. I didn't have a big problem with him being load, somewhat oafish and played more for comic relief because he did a good job with it. However, they should have had a flashback scene showing him as the tall, muscular, square-jawed Red Guardian in his prime (along with the Winter Guard--Crimson Dynamo, Darkstar and Ursa Major). Maybe the team could have been standing atop a snow-covered hill as a force of troops were heading towards them. That's something that could have easily been shot green screen with two actors and two motion capture doubles standing in for the CGI Bear and Crimson Dynamo armor. That one scene would have perfectly contrasted with the overweight, bearded and broken Alexei. The audience could better empathize with why he harkened back to those glory days and the characterization would have made more sense.
• Yes, the final battle was a rubbery CGI mess.
• I know folks will complain about the "girl power" moment when the Widows came back. By that point the movie had already painted itself into a corner, so... meh. But where do the Widows go from there? What about the other hundreds (thousands) of other Widows on Dreykov's map? It was never explained whether they were simply identified targets for acquisition into the program, in early- or mid-stage training, embedded, "sleepers," etc. 1) if they were out in the field as actives or sleepers there should have been 50 to 100 at most. 2) Had they been sleepers and Dreykov's scheme been to activate them for a synchronized destabilization strike as mentioned above, Nat could have destroyed the data key, thereby giving them the freedom to continue with their lives because the activation order will never come.
• When Nat went off to help Yelena I thought Taskmaster and the armor might disappear, but nope she was still there and the Widows took her aboard, presumably so that Milena could disable her chip and for cosmetic surgery.
• Unfortunately, Marvel has wasted a cool villain/anti-hero that could have otherwise been a perfect addition to the Dark Avengers.
• I did like the "family" thread throughout.
• The setup for Yelena was fine since Marvel wants to keep her around. It's more interesting than just having her take Natasha's slot on the roster.

 

[jye4ever]

Scarjo is in such a hardcore mission to bring down the powerful old white male corporate executives that my jaw was on the ground when…

Spoiler

the old white male villain began to brutally beat her down with physical punches and slaps that was choreographed to look like domestic abuse and her mocking him just like Joker did to Batman in TDK during his beatdown scene.

It was shown up close with NO cut away!

THAT WAS IN A COMIC BOOK MCU MOVIE, I believe a first!

It was more hardcore than most R rated movies!

 

[jye4ever]

This movie really sounds more and more like a mess and a pointless train wreck.

That only the diehard can do no wrong MCU Fanboys will drool over... And maybe the woke SJW/LGBTQ only fans will praise. Surprised we haven't seen articles that Widow and the other chick are actually in love. Like we had to deal with Cap Mavel and her friend, and Bucky & Sam. LGBTQ fans longing for something that isn't actually there.

The "twist" ending sounds so dumb. Not only does it ruin an established character, but it somewhat even takes away from the intended "girl power" message (girls strong and smart, boys weak willed and dumb). And worse of all, It's even not remotely new & cool anymore when it's already been done. Especially when used in a movie owned by the same studio that failed miserably.

The more I read the less I think I ever want to watch this. Even when free on D+.

The family dynamics was actually pretty well done as was the twist.

However…

The absurd action with non enhanced rubber black widow was absolutely over the top ridiculous it killed any and all tension.

 

[a-dev]

and no mention of Putin.

I don't think the MCU references real political figures, does it? Think of the US president in Iron Man 3....

 

[Jim Morrison]

Film's all over the place - fair to say it's not a classic (well, I guess it might be to some folks). Florence Pugh was the highlight for me - really looking forward to seeing more of her character in the MCU. Weisz & Harbour were also very engaging. But what were they thinking casting Ray Winstone? Awful, awful, awful.

And what they did with Taskmaster - absolute dog ****.

 

[nexus]

I don't think the MCU references real political figures, does it? Think of the US president in Iron Man 3....

Even a generic "Premier".
They did use photos of recognizable political figures.

 

[Victοr]

The last two flicks I watched were this and Tomorrow War. I don't know which one was the worst between the two, really. That was genuinely dumb. This was just embarassing. I liked the tone of the first scene and figured that I'd be in for a fun Spy-Fi flick. But nope. Plot holes, bad dialog, an agenda over logic, wasted actors and characters, all the while the entire thing felt like an extended TF&TWS episode. I generally like the Spy-Fi genre, but this was too boring to keep my attention. I played it at 2.5x and still felt drained. Harbour continues to bring charisma and get wasted. I won't even talk about Task"master".

You know what, I'm going back to my pretentious arthouse. At least those have moody aesthetics instead of dumb CGI. And to think people harped on Bayformers...

 

[matticus]

Even a generic "Premier".
They did use photos of recognizable political figures.

Yeah like Bill Clinton. Couldn't believe they used a real life Liberal politician meeting with a fictional villain. Guess Dirty Old Man Bill Clinton is off the no touch liberal list. If I was him I would sue just cause they took that liberty (although we all could see that in real life lol).

 

[Dave_W]

@darthkostis How do you watch a film at x2.5 speed and know there's plot holes and bad dialog?

 

[Victοr]

@darthkostis How do you watch a film at x2.5 speed and know there's plot holes and bad dialog?

...I keep up with it? Most movies have a very slow pace. I was shocked at how drawn out The Clone Wars episodes and dialogue felt at normal speed. Seriously, try it and you'll see that you can save time this way. I've fast-forwarded a lot of films like this that are good enough to kill time, but not really great. Besides, it doesn't take much attention to notice such glaring problems as a wreck of a helicopter entering Russian airspace, near a heavily guarded prison to boot, and nobody noticing it. What, they hacked it all? You can't have your prison both be nearing a collapse, and be super-techy and also heavily guarded. Did they seriously not have a single watchman there? Come on. Or how about the abhorent cut from Ross surrounding them to... Widow being free. Or the fact that she alludes that she's going to go break them out of prison/the Raft, when we literally saw Cap do it in CW. Sure, I probably missed Taskmistress great lines or more jokes about "superhero landing" (come on, you need at least 5, I noticed 3 but I'm sure there were more...) or Red Guardian being an oaf, but, well... It doesn't deserve more of my time.

 

[generalszabo]

I really liked the film, I liked all the links to other films, before and after when it's set. The humour generally landed and I'm looking forward to seeing statues from it. There was only so much peril you could put her in as well as we know it'll all be fine - until she dies of course lol

Some of the CGI could have been better and at the end of the day it was just another marvel film, but it fits in perfectly and was a fun watch. My personal fave was the opening credits, really set the scene with cool music

 

[matticus]

darthkostis just lives at x2.5 the normal speed of humans