While 2012 will bring new movies featuring the “Big Three” of American superheroes — Superman, Batman and Spider-Man — as well as the years-in-the-works "Avengers" film, we have to make do this summer with the second string, which includes Thor, Captain America and now The Green Lantern.
The movie's mythology is convoluted. It takes more than a full hour to get going, and (par for the course this summer) there was no reason for it to be in 3D. But "The Green Lantern" redeems itself with a killer third act, taking advantage of a strong cast and a director who knows what he's doing.
A DC Comics property dating back to 1940, the Green Lantern's mythology concerns a powerful green life force harnessed by a galaxy-wide committee of aliens (sort of like the Jedi Council), who sees the primary movers of the universe as Will and Fear (which bear more than a passing resemblance to The Force and the Dark Side).
When a top alien comes to earth and dies, his ring falls into the hands of fighter pilot Hal Jordan (Ryan Reynolds). It's up to him to save the world and possibly even the entire universe, while also doing battle with an alien-infected mad scientist (Peter Sarsgaard) who has designs on Hal's sometime girlfriend (Blake Lively).
The film's first hour is just a mess, as the mythology with the aliens is laid out in a boring and nonsensical way that no one who hasn't read the comics could possibly care about. The movie is credited to four writers, which tends not to be a good sign.
Then there's an airplane dogfight sequence that's practically a shot-for-shot remake of "Top Gun," right down to Reynolds' character being haunted by his heroic pilot father who died in a crash. (The father angle, which seems to motivate everything in the first act, is never mentioned again afterward.)
However, around the halfway point, things begin to recover, and that happens for a few reasons. The plot gets going and we get some strong action scenes, motivated by a brilliant, beautifully realized gimmick in which Reynolds can visualize any weapon he wants to use in battle. Also, we quickly realize that Ryan Reynolds was born to play a superhero and that Peter Sarsgaard was born to play a super villain.
Reynolds' natural charisma is an asset in the role, and while I didn't believe many things in this movie, I believed that he was a superhero. He has also got pretty strong chemistry with Lively, in a role that's much deeper than the average comic book movie girl part. And Sarsgaard, despite an underwritten role that doesn't give him enough to do, is his usual delightfully creepy self as a nerdy scientist who becomes more and more grotesque as the movie goes on, eventually looking like the Elephant Man.
"The Green Lantern" was directed by Martin Campbell, who knows his way around both action and franchise launches, having directed the James Bond debuts of both Pierce Brosnan and Daniel Craig.
Despite the movie's sluggish pacing in the beginning, he does a very good job handling the action scenes, especially a blowout, set in space, at the end. We can always follow what's going on, although, once again, there's nothing with 3D that wouldn't have been better in 2D.
I also give the movie credit for confounding our expectations in a couple of different ways.
First, we're introduced to a company that's an aviation/defense contractor, and they somehow don't end up being the villains - I was sure, for instance, that Tim Robbins' character would be revealed as the ultimate baddie.
I was especially surprised when we find out there's a mysterious evil force called "The Parallax," but it turns out to be a super-alien that looks like the Kraken.
Also, "The Green Lantern" doesn't pretend that Reynolds' character, like Clark Kent, isn't obviously recognizable in a mask that only covers his eyes.
You may not even remember it past next week, and its based around a mythology that I absolutely couldn't care less about, but "The Green Lantern" nevertheless delivers more excitement than your average summer 2011 superhero movie.
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