There are going to be spoilers. Just be warned.
We saw Hancock Tuesday night, during one of the “pre-opening” shows (what is it with stretching out these opening weekends?), and I am still astounded at what a misfire that movie was. Because for the first half of the movie, it was interesting, it was funny, it was a fun movie experience.
And then it falls apart. I mean, there should have been tape and staples and bolts on screen showing how hard it was to keep this thing together. And Darin and I can both point to the moment when the WTF? was written all over the script. It’s the moment I’ve seen hinted at in so many reviews, the big “twist.” I don’t know what they were thinking. “We need some kind of big Ooooh moment”? “We need to explain everything that’s happened”? “We hired Charlize Theron and we don’t know what the hell to do with her”?
Did you know Charlize Theron was in this movie? ‘Cause she isn’t in any of the trailers.
In case you don’t know the plot of this movie: Will Smith is Hancock, a superhero with an attitude and a drinking problem. He causes as many problems as he solves (and maybe even more). He rips up freeways to stop bad guys, he drinks quarts of liquor, and he’s grumpy to everyone, even little kids. And then one day he saves PR guy Ray (Jason Bateman, who once again proves he is the bar-none best straight man in the business, treating the looniness that’s going on absolutely seriously) from being hit by a train. Of course, the train is a complete wreck and once again Hancock has caused way more trouble than he’s saved. All of the lookers-on scream at Hancock, call him worthless, ask him what his problem is. But Ray thanks him and defends him to the crowd and then invites him over to his house for dinner, where they discuss how Ray is going to change Hancock’s image and make people love him. Ray’s wife (Charlize Theron) takes an instant dislike to the rude, hungover superhero, but Hancock finds himself attracted to her. Which is problematic, see, as Ray is the only guy who likes him.
All good, right?
Enter Ye Olde Plot Twist.
I have a copy of Tonight He Comes, the screenplay that was developed into Hancock, to see if the twist was in there, and maybe it was explained better. I have heard such amazing things about this screenplay that I had to check it out. For one thing, it is dark. Everything about it is dark. The characters are all seriously unlikable. I can see why it would garner interest, and I can see why it had to be “developed,” because no way would this make it on screen.
It doesn’t have the Plot Twist. Maybe it was the work of the second credited writer, Vince Gilligan. Or maybe it was someone else.
(And here it comes, turn away now if you don’t want to know what the twist is.)
Hancock tries to kiss Ray’s wife…and she responds by throwing him through a wall! Oh my! Hancock thought he was alone—but he’s not! There IS another one just like him!
(Btw, the fact that Hancock is saved by the guy who just happens to be married to the only other superhero in existence? Is explained. So that’s not even the part that doesn’t work.)
Suddenly Charlize is wearing black leather and has crazy eye makeup! Is she…a supervillain? Hancock doesn’t care, he just wants answers about who he is and where he comes from and she can answer them! So she does—they’re both immortals, it turns out. In fact, they’re married. Because the way the system was set up was that these uber-powerful immortals would be paired up, and when they’re near one another they’re actually mortal, see, which is why she abandoned him 80 years ago —
That? That’s the sound of the movie falling apart.
Whatever happens at this point—he gets shot, the bad guys show up to kill him in the hospital (because apparently there’s a “Hancock is suddenly mortal!” hotline or something), Charlize gets hurt, what oh what will Hancock do to save her?—It’s all nonsense. We went from a “What if a superhero had to learn to be a good guy?” story to a “We have some kind of immortal love that is completely unsupported by evidence in the movie” story because they’d fucking hired Charlize Theron and had nothing for her to do. I’m not saying that they couldn’t have done something more interesting with the revelation of who Ray’s wife was. But I don’t think it was necessary, and what they did completely destroyed the movie.
Well. That was a couple hundred million you guys pissed away. That’s all I gotta tell you.
The trailer that I saw that I was mad about because I thought it spoiled the whole movie had Charlize Theron in it saying something about “you’re becoming mortal.”
I am so effing tired of the people who make trailers thinking I’m too dense to like a movie if there’s a plot twist not shown in the previews. QUIT SPOILING EVERY MOVIE.
I must not have seen that preview. Alas.
The reason marketers spoil every movie is that WORKS. People would rather see a movie where they already know the general gist of things than be completely surprised. Thank you, television.