Deadpool opens with probably the funniest gag in the whole film: an opening credits scene that substitutes the actors and crew members for generic descriptions of who they are. The cast includes "A comedic actor" (Ryan Reynolds), "A hot chick" (Morena Baccarin), and "A british villain" (Ed Srkein), and finishes with "Directed by An Overpaid Toolbag." There are several others sprinkled throughout that I won't give away, but the best was definitely the writer's credit.
This sets the stage for essentially what Deadpool is; a comic-book movie that knows it is a comic-book movie. Deadpool (Reynolds) starts by telling us he fellated Wolverine to get the film, and the fourth wall jokes more or less don't stop coming as the movie makes knowing references to its very existence.
This is all fine and funny in a very Mel Brooks way, although there is nothing quite as fourth-wall breaking as the characters watching the movie they are in in Spaceballs (1987). Deadpool makes reference to a fourth-wall break within a fourth-wall break, but that's about as meta as the movie gets. The rest is a bunch of more-or-less funny throwaway gags that are akin to the MacFarlane animated universe (Family Guy specifically), although they always seem at least connected to what is going on.
The movie proper is about an anti-villain, Wade Wilson (keeping with Marvel's grand tradition of alliterative names), an ex-mercenary for hire who falls in love (Baccarin) and seems to pretty happy, until he learns he has cancer. He is approached to undergo an intense procedure that would accelerate the mutant gene in his DNA (this takes place in the X-Men universe, although barley any of them are present as the movie cheekily acknowledges), and finds himself in the hands of a sadist, Ajax, who grants him the power of healing, at the cost of his physical appearance.
The rest of the movie follows Wilson as he adapts to his horrible new look and pursues Ajax, who claims to have a cure. Along the way he is ashamed of himself and can't face his girlfriend for fear she will reject him, because he is so shallow that he knows he would reject himself.
Despite all the fourth-wall humor and acknowledgment of the clichés, this movie is fairly paint-by-numbers in terms of plot beats. The girlfriend becomes the Damsel-in-Distress, although refreshingly the final battle does not involve the stakes of the world proper. But nothing particularly interesting or exciting happens here, as the movie trods out the same tired old clichés that it is mocking. That's all fine and good, but for a movie like this that promised so much in its marketing, I was hoping for something a bit edgier.
The movie earns its R rating, if you can say that. Heads fly, blood splatters, obscene phrases are unleashed. A lot of people celebrate this as being the first real mainstream "adult" superhero film, but I think people are blurring the line between jokes appropriate for adults, and movies made for adults. Deadpool is strictly the former, as it is definitely not appropriate for an underage crowd, but it offers nothing of substance or variety to the more mature audiences its targeting (although, let's be real, Deadpool's real goal is the 13 - 16 year old boys who will be sneaking into this). Plus, Marvel itself is doing a lot more interesting, "adult" stuff with the superhero genre in their Netflix outings (Daredevil and Jessica Jones so far).
Overall, Deadpool is a pretty good time. The jokes fly fast so that if a few miss the mark, at least something will land. And the movie shifts between fourth wall humor and a more serious take on the situation and achieves an impressive tonal balance, which is to be commended. Basically, you'll know if you'll like Deadpool from the red-band trailer. It's one of the few times that you can honestly trust the marketing to sell you the film.
No comments:
Post a Comment