Movie & Reviews
Hancock: Strong acting can’t make up for second- (and third-) act slump.
By Elyse Reel
Jul 9, 2008 - 11:31:26 AM

** 1/2 out of five

If there’s a national American pastime, finding weaknesses in the strong must surely be it. There’s something satisfying to most of us in tearing other people down, and who better to rip to shreds than the superhero – the symbol of ultimate power and good?

How exciting, then, when a superhero comes along with a new level of fallibility. The titular hero of Hancock, played by Will Smith, is a self-loathing, lazy, profane boozer with no memory of his past and a penchant for mass destruction. In short, he’s a powerful jerk, and the country hates his guts.

When the film coasts along on Hancock’s alcohol-fueled misadventures, it seems to be doing a fine job of it. (Second-favorite American pastime: Watching trainwrecks in action. Can’t go wrong here.) But that concept is not enough to sustain an entire movie, and so we introduce a new character to carry things along: Ray (Jason Bateman), a PR guy who’s more interested in saving the world than Hancock is. When Hancock saves his life, Ray decides to revamp the superhero’s image.

Still, so far, so good – Bateman’s a strong actor, if playing another variation on his “Arrested Development’’ role, and the idea of a PR overhaul is a nice twist on the superhero tale. Smith and Bateman work well together, and there are many scenes that bring smiles and a few laughs.

Then we hit the 45-minute mark, and things, in turn, hit the fan.

Horrified by the realization that they ran out of plot after Hancock’s slow and painful transformation into a more likable guy, the screenwriters are forced to introduce an absolutely ridiculous subplot involving Mary (Charlize Theron), Ray’s wife. It’s convoluted, poorly thought out, and laughable, and even a blind man could see it coming from ten miles away. It also sends Hancock into a tailspin. Everything we might have been enjoying about the film’s first half is gone, replaced by a nonsensical storyline that we can’t enjoy because we’re too busy trying to unravel its internal logic. I lost count of the number of times I wanted to jump up and shout, “What? What?!” at the screen.

Not helping matters any is Tobias A. Schliesser’s cinematography, which employs the old favorite – you guessed it! – shaky cam. For a delightful bonus, Schliesser likes zooming in up so close on his subjects’ faces that we can count their pores, and so that half the screen is taken up by blurry outlines of other characters’ backs and shoulders. What a treat. I felt like a paparazzo.

So if there’s anyone who’s looking for an antidote to the crush of superhero films Hollywood’s been producing lately, Hancock ain’t it – unless you walk out halfway through, that is.

Come to think of it, that walkout advice? That goes for anybody.

Hancock runs 92 minutes and is rated PG-13 for some intense sequences of sci-fi action and violence, and language. Viewed at Commonwealth 20.

ereel@villagepublishing.com | 751-0421



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