Claiming that "Green Lantern" looks like a video game would be an insult to video games. Most of them have more atmosphere and are far more complex than this absolutely silly film. There have been mindless films before to be sure, but most of them were at least entertaining. This one on the other hand is a succession of ridiculous action sequences, interrupted by the occasional equally ridiculous real-life scene. The better superhero films from the last few years were all in a way grounded in reality which is why they worked. Here, the characters can't be taken seriously so the audience is unable to relate to them.
I can't tell you much about the "story" - I didn't pay a lot of attention and I am pretty confident that I didn't miss much. During the 3D action scenes I mostly closed my eyes in order to spare them the exhaustion. The only scenes that were somehow bearable to watch were - as cheesy as they may be - the romantic scenes between Ryan Reynolds and Blake Lively, the primary reason being that any scene with Blake Lively in it is bearable to watch. She is just about the only real person in the film and as such her beautiful smile is a revelation in a testosterone fueled spectacle like this. She may not be a great actress but at least she is natural. Ryan Reynolds would have the potential to be a solid leading man too but he can't escape the absurdity of his character.
Questions that always come to my mind after viewing "films" like this are: does such a soulless product even deserve to be called "cinema" - a term with which we all associate so many great memories... and is this the beginning of the end of cinema as an art form that started out so gloriously during the days of the silent film? And even if cinema is considered only the medium and not the message, what do films like that say about the state of the world we're living in?
2/10
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| The chosen one: Ryan Reynolds in "Green Lantern" |
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