Wonder Woman (2017)
IMDB Rating : 8.4/10 (as on 03.06.2017)
Before she was Wonder Woman she was Diana, princess of the
Amazons, trained warrior. When a pilot crashes and tells of conflict in the
outside world, she leaves home to fight a war to end all wars, discovering her
full powers and true destiny.
PG-13 | 2h 21min | Action, Adventure, Fantasy
Director:
Patty Jenkins
Writers:
Allan Heinberg (screenplay), Zack Snyder (story by) | 3 more credits »
Stars: Gal
Gadot, Chris Pine, Robin Wright
‘Wonder
Woman’ Is a Blockbuster That Lets Itself Have Fun
A.O. SCOTT
“Wonder
Woman” begins with ominous, lugubrious music (composed by Rupert
Gregson-Williams), a voice-over invocation of “darkness” and an aerial view of
the Louvre that seems full of sinister portent. The viewer may be forgiven a
shudder of dread. Are we really going to pick up where “Batman v Superman” left
off?
The
question is not rhetorical, and I’m relieved to report that the answer is no.
Once franchise continuity is established — a mysterious package from Bruce
Wayne arrives at the office of Wonder Woman’s alter ego, Diana Prince, who
works in the Louvre’s antiquities department — we are transported back to the
heroine’s earlier life, long before she became mixed up with Wayne and Clark
Kent. “Wonder Woman,” directed by Patty Jenkins from a script by Allan
Heinberg, briskly shakes off blockbuster branding imperatives and allows itself
to be something relatively rare in the modern superhero cosmos. It feels less
like yet another installment in an endless sequence of apocalyptic
merchandising opportunities than like … what’s the word I’m looking for? A
movie. A pretty good one, too.
By
which I mean that “Wonder Woman” tells an interesting, not entirely predictable
story (until the climax, which reverts, inevitably and disappointingly, to
dreary, overblown action clichés). It cleverly combines genre elements into
something reasonably fresh, touching and fun. Its earnest insouciance recalls
the “Superman” movies of the ’70s and ’80s more than the mock-Wagnerian
spectacles of our own day, and like those predigital Man of Steel adventures,
it gestures knowingly but reverently back to the jaunty, truth-and-justice
spirit of an even older Hollywood tradition.
This is
an origin story, first and foremost, establishing the mythic background and
modern mission of its main character. That kind of movie can be tedious, but
“Wonder Woman” is leavened by touches of screwball comedy, espionage caper and
romantic adventure, as well as by what might be the most credible superhero
screen kiss since upside-down Tobey .
This is
a star vehicle all the way. Ms. Gadot, who like the other Amazons speaks
English with an accent (though hers, unlike Ms. Wright’s or Ms. Nielsen’s, may
be a result of her Israeli background), has a regal, effortlessly charismatic
screen presence. She and Mr. Pine, who has Paul Newman’s seductive blue eyes
and a hint of Clark Gable’s raffish charm, give “Wonder Woman” a jolt of
classic Hollywood fizz. Their banter, long before that kiss, is lively and
sexy, and their oil-and-water temperaments emulsify nicely.
Ms.
Jenkins and Mr. Heinberg have synthesized a plausible modern archetype out of
comic-book and movie sources that may have seemed problematic to modern
sensibilities. Diana is erudite but unworldly, witty but never ironic,
supremely self-confident and utterly mystified by the modern world. Its
capacity for cruelty is a perpetual shock to her, even though she herself is a
prodigy of violence. Her sacred duty is to bring peace to the world.
Accomplishing it requires a lot of killing, but that’s always the superhero
paradox.
“Wonder
Woman,” though, resists the reflexive power-worship that drags so many
superhero movies — from the Marvel as well as the DC universes — into the mire
of pseudo-Nietzschean adolescent posturing. Unlike most of her male counterparts,
its heroine is not trying to exorcise inner demons or work out messiah issues.
She wants to function freely in the world, to help out when needed and to be
respected for her abilities. No wonder she encounters so much resistance.
Read full review at New york times
With Wonder Woman, DC Comics Finally Gets It Right
CHRISTOPHER ORR
Another World War. Another
cache of German superweapons intended to rain death upon an unsuspecting
metropolis. Another act of supreme self-sacrifice. Another guy named Chris
playing another guy named Steve.
There are moments in Wonder
Woman that recall Captain America: The First Avenger a little too closely for
comfort. The principal difference, of course, is that this Chris/Steve—that
would be Chris Pine, playing Steve Trevor—is not the movie’s principal hero,
but rather her sidekick and love interest. There was some reason to be leery of
this arrangement, because Pine is an established movie star (and, it turns out,
a more than solid actor), while Wonder Woman is played by the relatively
obscure Israeli actress and model Gal Gadot. Would she be able to hold her own,
or would this serve as yet another chapter in the difficulty of accommodating
female characters into that most boyish of genres, the superhero movie?
Happily, Gadot holds her own
with exceptional poise and gusto, whether bantering with Pine or charging into
a nest of German sniper fire. And thank goodness. Following its iffy outing
with director Zack Snyder’s Man of Steel and the sequential disasters of
Snyder’s Batman v Superman and the Snyder-infused Suicide Squad, DC Comics and
Warner Bros. needed an installment in their universe-building effort that
was—how to put this?—not awful.
Befitting its World War I
setting, Wonder Woman has a certain throwback charm, with Gadot and Pine
playing off one another as good-naturedly as partners in a 1930s screwball
comedy. It’s a vibe that stands in particular contrast to the bitter,
Snyderesque unpleasantries—Do you bleed? You will!—that characterized the
movie’s immediate DC predecessors.
Will our heroes manage to put
an end to the War to End All Wars? Will Ares eventually show his true face? Is
the human race, with its hatred and its wars, even worth saving? You can
probably guess the answers to all of these questions, and they are, as usual,
largely beside the point.
Directing from a script by
Allan Heinberg, Patty Jenkins (Monster) favors character over conflict, an
approach that yields precisely the happy results one might have anticipated.
Gadot, in particular, is a delight as Diana: supremely capable yet utterly
innocent, a big fish who has left her little pond and now finds herself out of
water altogether. As her guide to the ways of the masculine world—which consist
principally of lying and pointless fighting—Pine’s Steve is equal parts
incredulous and enraptured toward Diana.
Wonder Woman does have its
share of flaws. At two hours and 20 minutes, it is considerably overlong. A
more compelling villain would have helped matters, and one scene in which Diana
brutally impales a foe with her sword is an incongruous fit with the movie’s
overall tone. Also, it seems a bit retrograde to have the first big female-led
superhero film end with the lesson that “only love can truly save the
world”—especially given the abundant evidence that what actually saved the
world was Gal Gadot kicking ass all over Belgium.
The final big action sequence,
as now seems always to be the case, is a messy and overwrought CGI
extravaganza. But at least the movie that precedes it involves actual
characters—likeable ones, even!—exhibiting recognizable human emotions. Here’s
hoping that DC and Warner Bros. have registered the value of such
straightforward pleasures in time for Snyder’s upcoming Justice League. If even
he can learn such a lesson, perhaps there’s hope for the human race after all.
Read full review at The Atlantic
Gal Gadot to DC’s rescue
Deborah Cornelious
There’s never really been much
competition between Marvel and DC when it comes to films from their extended
universes. The former has been miles ahead. And even when DC tried, it tanked
hard and how with Superman (Man of Steel), Batman (Batman v Superman: Dawn of
Justice) and even Suicide Squad. And now comes Wonder Woman like a beacon of
light in the dark, one that saved the previous DC debacle with Ben Affleck and
Henry Cavill in Dawn of Justice.
In DC’s latest, we get the
Wonder Woman origin story where Amazonian princess Diana (Gal Gadot) becomes
the superhero she’s born to be. When American spy Steve Trevor (Chris Pine)
crashes on Themyscira, Diana along with the rest of the women on the island
learn of the ongoing World War I. Believing the bloodshed to be the doing of
Ares, the God of War, Diana sets out with Steve to try and destroy Ares and
stop the Germans from killing millions of people.
As Wonder Woman, Gadot is
entirely the anchor of the film. A superhero character has never been so
charismatic while simultaneously being unrealistic. Gadot’s Wonder Woman swoons
when she sees babies, melts when tasting ice cream and looks at battle with a
fierce eye. She knows a woman, nay a person can be different things at
different times. And thanks to wonder director Patty Jenkins, seeing women
fight on screen in this film is an adrenaline-pumping thrilling experience.
You’re dead inside if those goosebumps don’t emerge when Diana or any of her
Amazonian islanders leap and bound in combat. Thankfully, (Jenkins), there’s
never a single moment that panders to male audiences despite the titular
character’s obviously sexualised outfit. Jenkin doesn’t short-change her male
characters. They just play second fiddle (for once) to a strong female
protagonist who shines throughout.
The decision to set Wonder
Woman during WWI amplifies its feminist angle. For instance, one scene has
members of the British cabinet gripe in anger at the presence of Diana,
because, well no women allowed when important men have to decide the future of
the world. But in the end, it’s Diana who helps the very same men decipher
important documents and beat the Germans. Jenkins’ subtle comments on
empowerment are peppered throughout the film.
But there’s very little spark
in Wonder Woman other than Gadot. Even the war takes a backseat to Diana’s
transformation from Amazonian princess to superhero. But it’s her romantic arc
with Trevor, steely belief in the good of humans and unwavering righteousness
that all add up to make a wholesome good-versus-evil film that’s surely bound
for success.
Read full review at The Hindu
Movie rating ★★★✬☆
Gal Gadot and her superhero will be a hard act to
follow
Shalini Langer
She may have been lost in the
mess that was Batman vs Superman, but there is little chance of that happening
again. Gal Gadot bursts onto DC Comics’s superhero scene with Wonder Woman, an
old-fashioned good vs an evil film that has a scale, that has ambition, that
has the required full-blown finale, but, above all, that has a heart.
After brooding, depressed
heroes who dragged a cold, dark world down with them, we have one who still
believes the world can be a better — and warmer — place, and looks gorgeous in
the process. The fact that this is DC Comic’s first woman superhero isn’t to be
taken lightly, nor the fact that the film has at its helm a woman director who
makes Gadot look empowering in the metallic bikini she sports.
In another subtle, but telling
touch, putting her apart from her testosterone-fuelled male counterparts,
Wonder Woman (never called that in this origin film) a.k.a Diana Prince doesn’t
work alone, or even aspire to do so. She has genuine partners she respects, led
by an equally warm, good-looking and traditional hero-like Chris Pine.
We first meet Diana in the
present age, working at Louvre. The fact that she is one of the Marvels is
quickly, and briefly, dealt with by a briefcase she receives from Bruce Wayne
with a photograph of her in her Wonder Woman costume from around World War I.
Diana thinks back to her
childhood, on an island inhabited by the Amazons, and kept hidden from the
outside world by Zeus. The Amazons are believed to be the only ones who can
save the world from Zeus’s son Ares, the God of War. Diana’s mother (played by
Nielsen) wants her to know as little of this corrupted human world through as
possible and is opposed in this by her sister (Robin Wright).
Once Pine’s Steve has found his
way to the island though while escaping German troops in WWI — he is an
American spy, working with the British — you know it is only a matter of time
before Diana discovers this world, and the war.
Jenkins makes a light touch of
the introduction to Diana, even pulling off the training-in-warfare part where
a lot of many women jump around doing acrobatics in leather and holding swords,
which is impressive despite all the laws of physics it thwarts. She has an even
lighter touch handling the awkward moments between Diana and Steve, who is the
first man she has ever seen, including in the nude. There is a beautiful scene
under the moon, in a boat, as they sail out to England and mayhem, where Diana
tells Steve how she has read all of bodily pleasures and concluded that men are
okay for procreation, not so much for pleasure. Steve, asked by Diana if he is
“like the average man”, tries half-embarrassed to explain that, well, he is
considered “above average” at home, particularly as being a spy, he must have a
certain “vigour”. Much, much later, when they kiss, serenaded by snowflakes, it
is authentic and natural, not a contrived plot device.
Israeli actress Gadot is
assured and confident in her first big role, as good with the comic aspects of
Diana discovering a new life, including corsets, as with her heartbreak at
discovering the horrors of man’s cruelty. It helps that the setting is a war
that actually happened, rather than a battle with aliens that may never come to
pass. Pine plays a heartwarming second fiddle, letting Gadot take the lead and
letting his awe show.
The film only drags when it
must get into its second half, of big fights and big climax, and some rather
juvenile talk of the true nature of mankind. The big reveal is a little
disappointing, and more than rushed.
Which also means that since
this is the territory Wonder Woman is likely to inhabit in subsequent films,
Jenkins’s is going to be a hard act to follow.
Read full review at Indian Express
Movie rating ★★★☆ ☆
Gal Gadot the best thing about superhero's
blockbuster comeback
Jake Wilson
Why has it taken so long for
Wonder Woman, still among the best-known of all superheroes, to return to the
big screen? Sexism, no doubt, is part of the explanation, but it also must be
said that even by comic book standards the character's mythology is pretty
wacky.
Nor are her credentials as a
feminist icon beyond dispute (her creator, psychologist and bondage enthusiast
William Moulton Marston, deserves a film in himself). Still, this blockbuster
comeback is inherently more interesting than yet another rehash of Batman or
Spider-Man – and on its own terms, at least a qualified success.
Making a comeback of her own,
director Patty Jenkins (Monster) sticks with something like the received
version of Wonder Woman's origin story.
Still more than most
superheroes, Diana is whatever the script needs her to be at any given moment.
She's a fighter and a lover of peace; she can speak hundreds of languages but
is unfamiliar with the concept of marriage. She's horrified at cruelty that the
rest of us take for granted, yet she's quick to get over the shock of her
first-ever battle, in which a significant number of Amazons appear to perish.
But even if certain dramatic
opportunities have been wasted, it's a plus that Jenkins doesn't try to
"transcend" her material: this is a straight-up fantasy adventure,
not an ironic goof or an art film in disguise. Visually, there's little of the
darkness that has been a hallmark of the DC Cinematic Universe in films such as
Suicide Squad – though the bloodless action sequences are in the DC
house-style, with plenty of slow motion, speed ramping and heroic posing.
What's best about the film can
be summed up in two words: Gal Gadot. This much could have been predicted after
Gadot's brief but attention-grabbing appearance as Diana in Batman V Superman,
where she had no trouble stealing attention from the dour leads. All the same,
I was initially in two minds about her soft voice and melting smile: was she
forceful enough for the role?
That misses the point, which is
that Diana is too secure in her identity for outward displays of aggression.
Gadot's Israeli background may be the key to her manner, which is equable,
warmly amused, and in the Hollywood context, distinctly foreign. Jenkins and her
writers make the most of this, with touches of fish-out-of-water comedy – as
when Diana tries ice-cream for the first time – that recall Greta Garbo's role
as a Russian envoy in the 1939 Ernst Lubitsch
classic Ninotchka.
As a superior being with no stake
in Western civilisation, Diana is an ideal mouthpiece for social criticism.
It's too bad that Jenkins' evident brief was to make a film that parents can
bring their young daughters to, meaning anything that risks being too
provocative – in other words, too interesting – has been filtered out.
There are only sketchy details
about how Amazon society works, and Diana tends to shrug off misogyny rather
than confront it directly. Even her love scenes with Steve are too coy and
abbreviated to let us know what she really feels about men.
Read full review at Sydney morning Herald
Can We Build a Better Blockbuster? Wonder Woman Points
a Way Forward
Stephanie Zacharek
Can a woman build a better
superhero movie? If Patty Jenkins’ Wonder Woman is any indication, the answer
is: sort of.
The first half of Jenkins’ picture
has a quietly pleasurable power, largely because at that point it seems to be
trying to bust the expected template. But when the epic battles start
raging—so…many…epic…battles—we’re back to business as usual. Because in the
world we live in, a woman-directed superhero movie, with a woman as the key
character, had better not be so very different from the dude-centric ones. Baby
steps.
Even so, Wonder Woman is a cut
above nearly all the superhero movies that have been trotted out over the past
few summers. That’s largely thanks to the charm of its star, Gal Gadot, playing
the Amazon princess Diana Prince, a woman raised on an island of women warriors
who takes it upon herself to stop World War I. Why not think big?
Gadot is simply marvelous.
Physically, she’s bold and commanding. But there’s a sweetness about her too,
as if she and Jenkins understand intuitively that Wonder Woman can’t just be
blandly awesome. She's got to be able to feel wonder too. Gadot carries the
movie through even its sloggiest parts, most notably the big action sequences
that pile up at the end. Sometimes, multiple climaxes are a bad thing. The
special effects are massive but uninspiring, and the action is slightly jerky
in places. This isn’t necessarily Jenkins’ fault. It just comes with the
territory of the summer blockbuster, as filmmakers strive to make the effects
bigger and more impressive while also less surprising. All superhero movies
must obey the commands of box-office expectations, and forever it must be thus.
Wonder Woman, who first
appeared in a 1941 DC Comics, has been waiting a long time—at least 10 years,
if not 75— to make it to the big screen. Joss Whedon wrote a script, ultimately
rejected, more than a decade ago. Michelle McLaren, who had directed episodes
of Game of Thrones and Breaking Bad, was also previously associated with the
project. Like McLaren, Jenkins has also worked mostly in television—she hasn’t
made a movie since her solid 2003 debut, Monster. And while her hiring as the
director of Wonder Woman has been hailed as a step forward for women in
Hollywood, we should also be careful what we wish for. After cutting their
teeth on small, independent films, directors often want the challenge—as well
as the paycheck and the prestige—of making a big-budget blockbuster. But today,
that arena is rarely where people do their best work. Women have a better
chance at making powerful, meaningful movies if they work outside the big
studios—and that goes for men, too.Still, Jenkins’ Wonder Woman points a way
forward toward the possibility of better blockbusters. The movie’s opening
section, which details Diana’s path from scrappy girl to fearless warrior, is
clever and lively, as well as gorgeous to look at. On the island, Diana’s
warrior-wear is a distressed-metallic leather bustier topping a sort of tutu-like
Utilikilt. Leaping and soaring through her training, she’s like one of Degas’
bronze ballerina sculptures grown up and come to life, strong and free and at
least a little pissed off. Her grand jeté is all muscle and all heart. At last,
it’s her time to shine.
Read Full review at Time
Movie rating ★★☆☆ ☆
Glass ceiling still intact as Gal Gadot reduced to
weaponised Smurfette
Steve Rose
Those hoping a shot of
oestrogen would generate a new kind of comic-book movie – and revive DC’s
faltering movie universe – might need to lower their expectations. Like many
people out there, I had no shortage of excitement and goodwill towards this
female-led superhero project, but in the event it’s plagued by the same
problems that dragged down previous visits to the DC movie world:
over-earnestness, bludgeoning special effects, and a messy, often wildly
implausible plot. What promised to be a glass-ceiling-smashing blockbuster
actually looks more like a future camp classic.
There’s something rather
distasteful about co-opting trench warfare as the backdrop to a sanitised,
hyper-stylised fantasy. I couldn’t help thinking of Kendall Jenner’s disastrous
“protest chic” Pepsi ad. And when Gadot is called upon to communicate the
horrors of war moments later, reeling around dazed and confused in a haze of
orange poison gas, it’s a moment of Zoolander-esque silliness that brings home
how weightless the whole story has become. Gadot is entirely credible as the
embodiment of Amazonian perfection, but there’s only so much emotion her
concerted brow-furrowing can convey.
Yes, yes, I know: “It’s only a
comic-book movie.” And on the level of big-budget trash, Wonder Woman is great
fun. But there were hopes for something more. Perhaps there were too many
rewrites and personnel changes (director Patty Jenkins was drafted in after the
first choice left; while all five credited writers and eight of the 10
producers are male). Perhaps DC struggled to find territory arch-rivals Marvel
hadn’t already claimed. They covered the mythical-deity-out-of-water angle with
Thor, and the superhero-joins-the-war-effort with Captain America. In Wonder
Woman, they had something none of their rivals had – a bona-fide brand-name
female superhero – but in trying to work out what to do with her, they seem to
have lost their way. She journeys from a land without men and winds up stranded
in no man’s land.
Read full review at The Guardian
Movie rating ★★★★ ☆
A thrillingly staged knockout blow for feminism
Robbie Collin
The main thing many of us have
been wondering about Wonder Woman is whether or not Warner Bros was actually
planning to release it. For months you could have heard a pin drop on the
publicity front: not exactly standard procedure in blockbuster tradecraft.
Perhaps the mere fact of it
being a female-led superhero film gave them jitters. Perhaps it had something
to do with the abuse meted out to the cast of last year’s all-women
Ghostbusters reboot.
Studios want hits, not causes,
and Wonder Woman is a cause in waiting. Of the 55 comic-book films produced by
Hollywood in the last decade, zero have been centred on a solo female
character: to put that statistic in its fullest perspective, that’s two fewer
than have been centred on dogs. Girls in costumes can be one of the boys – one
Avenger or X-Man of many – but for an unchaperoned heroine you have to go back
to 2005’s Elektra, and no-one should have to do that.
Thankfully now there’s no
reason to. Hit or not – and you’d better believe its box-office results will be
scrutinised under a microscope – Wonder Woman is close to a knockout on its own
ambitious terms. Patty Jenkins’ film officially belongs to the DC Extended
Universe, the same sunless and woebegone realm that brought us Batman v
Superman and Suicide Squad.
But Jenkins – whose only other
feature to date is the 2003 Charlize Theron showcase Monster – seems
uninterested in cameos and cross-promotion, and devotes every ounce of energy
to the story at hand.
It’s set far from franchise
continuity concerns, in the thick of the First World War, during which
demigoddess Diana (Gal Gadot) battles her way to the Western Front – where
Ares, a horny-headed foe of old, is overdue another thwarting.
Mythic backstories can be an
unholy trudge – see Batman v Superman’s pork-chop-headed Gustave Doré allusions
for details – but Jenkins parcels up Diana’s in an elegant animated sequence
that beguiles you into playing along. She also embraces the unmissably queer
slant of the original comic.
If the action in Wonder Woman
comes less frequently than you might expect, it’s also thrillingly designed and
staged, with a surging sense of real people, from all sorts of backgrounds,
swept up in the wider conflict’s churns and jolts. (Ewen Bremner’s wee,
sleekit, cowrin, tim'rous marksman, prowling the trenches in a kilt and
glengarry bonnet, is one of many great supporting turns that make a mark.)
As for the golden whip itself –
sorry, Lasso of Truth – its bondage overtones remain proudly intact, though the
camera is generally more comfortable gawping at Pine than Gadot, whose pin-up
status never edges out her standing as a hero to be reckoned with.
In a genre where fanboy
entitlement regularly calls the tune, Wonder Woman’s feminism – in its eagerly
daubed poster-paint strokes – feels like a rarity. Time will tell whether
Hollywood is about to find itself in the thrall of a heroine addiction. But as
the credits rolled, I was already craving another hit.
Read full review at Telegraph
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