Directed by Mark Steven Johnson. 96 minutes.
Starring Ben Affleck, Jennifer Garner, Michael Clarke Duncan, Colin Farrell, Jon Favreau, Joe Pantoliano, David Keith, and Ellen Pompeo. Released by 20th Century Fox.
Daredevil feels like the first half of a movie. Clocking in at a whopping ninety six minutes, the story, as it moves along briskly and to the point, does not appear to cover much ground. Based on its ending, the story of Daredevil seems designed for numerous sequels, but, considering, perhaps, that the film is not successful enough to warrant a follow up, what we are left with is a variety of characters and some basic introductions to them, blended with several violent fight sequences. That is not to say that Daredevil is all that bad. Upon viewing it the first time, I found myself unimpressed, yet upon my second screening of the film, I began to take it less seriously and focus in on some of its more positive elements. That is, of course, not to say that the film is not loaded with problems for it is. But it is not without its pleasures.
The film is yet another notch in the recent return of the comic book movie craze, which began with Spiderman last year. Over the next two years, we will see another Batman film, perhaps another Superman, definitely another Spiderman, as well as a second X Men film, The Hulk, The Green Lantern, and The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. At the film’s beginning, young Matt Murdock is splashed in the face with toxic waste, rendering him blind, yet leaving him with extraordinary talent in the other sense departments. He can even use these other senses to sort of give him a way of seeing, though when he completely visualizes other people whom he had never seen before going blind, I found myself having a hard time making the leap of faith. Another bad twist of fate occurs, when his father (David Keith), a boxer, refuses to throw a fight and is killed by the ruthless criminals whom he lost money for. Matt decides to use his sensory skills to fight crime and avenge his father’s death. He grows up into Ben Affleck.
Years later, Matt becomes a lawyer, who, through his sense of hearing, can sense whether or not a defendant is guilty or innocent. At night, he masquerades as the Daredevil, a self proclaimed “judge and jury,” which does not much to help his social life, which we recognize through a ridiculous answering machine message in which an unseen girlfriend breaks up with him. No matter. Shortly after, he meets Electra Nachios (Jennifer Garner, who inspired catcalls from all of the men in the audience when I screened the film), whom one of Murdock’s friends aptly puts it “sounds like a Mexican appetizer.” They have a Meet Cute, as Roger Ebert coined it, when they duke it out on a see saw as children on the playground watch in awe, one of the better scenes. Soon afterward, they have a PG-13 sex scene in the confines of Murdock’s seemingly impenetrable home in which the director opts for silly elevator sounding music, cuts to groping and frolicking statues, and close ups of fire places. Not one of the film’s better scenes.
When Murdock has yet another sad twist of fate, one that I will not give away, he seeks out the forces of evil in Gotham, which is, for the most part, the film’s long last sequence. First he takes on Bullseye, an occasionally entertaining and completely over-the-top Colin Farrell, an Irish assassin, who, when tired of listening to an old woman give him the story of her life, flicks a peanut, ricochets it off an airplane tray, and lands it in her throat, causing her to choke. He isn’t called Bullseye for nothing. Then, of course, Daredevil must seek out Kingpin (Michael Clarke Duncan), who apparently runs crime in New York, and settle some old scores. The fight scenes both in these scenes, as well as one in which Murdock tears up a bar full of lowlifes are both entertaining and somewhat muddled. On the one hand, the furious camera work and fast moving battles add excitement. On the other, they are often too murky or dark to see what is really going on (AKA Is Ben Affleck really doing all that fighting?), making me question the director’s faith in the film’s fight choreography.
If you can get past all of the film’s silliness, which, believe me there is much, Daredevil is pretty amusing. The film offers a variety of good supporting characters such as David Keith as Matt’s father, Joe Pantoliano as an inquisitive newspaper reporter, and especially Jon Favreau as Foggy Nelson, Murdock’s partner in law, who believes that the urban legend about alligators living in the sewers of New York and enjoys giving Matt a hard time by pouring mustard in his coffee. The chemistry between Affleck and Garner is reasonably good, especially during their fight scene. Colin Farrell, usually the scene stealer in every film he is in, strangely enough comes off a bit too peculiar as Bullseye. That’s not to say that watching him froth at the mouth and growl and hiss isn’t somewhat amusing and that his performance is bad. It’s just a bit too much considering the other characters play it mostly even tempered. Farrell is the wild card. Perhaps, his character was written that way.
Daredevil is better than some comic book films, not as good as some others. For the most part, I found it to be entertaining and the production values good. The film is apparently a labor of love for director Mark Steven Johnson and hopefully, should a sequel be made, he can show us why his first Daredevil movie feels only like an introduction, or a “first half” of a movie. Yes, the film is quite silly, often flawed, often downright ridiculous- what about that scene where Electra is fighting a series of bags falling from the ceiling of her apartment that, when it begins, feels like the finale of Flashdance mixed with some weird interpretive dance sequence- but it has its moments. The fight choreography is mostly good, the special effects are effective, and the characters are given reasonable motivations. But just one final question- why does Daredevil sleep in a coffin filled with water? Maybe that will get answered in the sequel.