Ahoy, squirts! Quint here. I'm not going to spend much time reviewing this film as it's not bad enough to enjoy giving it a nice tongue lashing and it's not good enough to want to urge anyone to go see it. ELEKTRA, (which has apparently had a last-minute name change according to the radio sponser guy that addressed the audience before the screening and called the movie ELEKTRICA... apparently it was so last minute they couldn't change the opening titles or dub the new name in for the rest of the movie, but I'll make sure everyone knows about it by continuing to call it ELEKTRICA throughout my review), is actually much better than I thought it was going to be, but it's still a crappy movie, which shows you just how much I was looking forward to this film.
Jennifer Garner is OK. I haven't watched more than an episode or two of ALIAS, so she's really a non-entity to me. She's alright. Not bad, not great. The real reason ELEKTRICA didn't make me want to put a bullet in my head was the 10 or so minutes that Terrance Stamp graced the screen. He plays Stick, the guy that brings Elektrica back to life and is apparently on the Yoda level of good guy that no one wants to fuck with. He shows up at one point during the movie and the core group of weirdo mystical assassins, seconds away from getting what they want, just disappear... "Another day, Old Man!"
Stamp is awesome and there should be a movie just about him... that'll happen whenever the Pai Mai film is ready for release, AKA never, but that would make a helluva double bill.
Anyway, the movie is filled with things that make no sense, like a guy staying behind... by himself to let Elektrica and the rest of her buddies get a head start on Typhoid Mary and the rest of the Hand thugs after clearly saying he doesn't give a rat's ass about the people Elektrica's protecting. There was no reason he couldn't have left with them and no reason to risk his life against The Hand, who he knows damn well are not to be fucked with. There are a lot of things like that in the movie. Stuff that happens only because they needed a connecting scene.
I won't ever watch this movie again. I won't buy the DVD no matter how many extras it comes with, but at the same time I didn't feel like clawing my eyeballs out of their sockets to escape the pain of the movie.
That's about all the energy I can spare on this movie. I did see the FANTASTIC FOUR trailer (click here for a few seconds of it on themoviebox.net!) and wasn't impressed by most of it... The Dr. Doom stuff is god-awful, the Stretchy-Arm Mr. Incredible was stupid looking, but that shot of The Thing crumpling that truck is killer, even if it is a rip-off of what was done in HELLBOY. For more on ELEKTRICA, I give you Cypher:
Hey Harry
First time, long time etc. For some strange reason Elektra got released here in Australia before the rest of the world (making up for the six month delay Daredevil had I guess) and, with free passes in hand, I went and saw it earlier today.
Now Im an easy person to please when it comes to movies: if it is reasonably entertaining then Im not too fussed. For perspective, I reasonably enjoyed The Punisher for what it was. Troy was terrible. We clear.
For those that want the short version: Elektra is a great lesson in how not to write or edit a film. This movie is boring, to a spectacular degree. Sorry, but that's what my mates thought too (one of whom loved Troy, go figure).
The problem with Elektra is that it tries to fit far too much character material into what is a very short running time. While it is obviously important to have character development in any film, this is supposed to be an action flick, yet two thirds of the running time are filled with scenes depicting the emotional state of our titular character. And to make matters worse, it really isnt something one cares about. Garner could be in an episode of Alias here, Elektra is Sydney Bristow by another name, yet in this film there isnt the slightest reason to care about anything going on. Its an hours' worth of dramatic worthelessness.
Now, this might be forgivable if the film was entertaining, but it isnt. The five core baddies (apparently based around semi-obscure Marvel characters) have a lot of potential, but between them have less screen time than one character would deserve. Just when you think that the film is about to pick up and get exciting, it's all over.
I think you get the idea. Im not even going to talk about the silly plot, it isnt worth worrying about. My advice to anyone who reads this is: dont bother. Elektra is easily the worst Marvel adaptation to the big screen in a long time.
Cypher
