Saturday 27 May 2017

Ant-Man (2015)


Directed by: Peyton Reed
Story by: Edgar Wright & Joe Cornish
Screenplay by: Edgar Wright, Joe Cornish, Adam McKay & Paul Rudd
Based on the comics by: Stan Lee, Larry Lieber and Jack Kirby 

Armed with a super-suit with the astonishing ability to shrink in scale but increase in strength, cat burglar Scott Lang must embrace his inner hero and help his mentor, Dr. Hank Pym, plan and pull off a heist that will save the world.


Ant-Man? Marvel isn't making movies about the actually interesting heroes, but we get a movie about Ant-Man?

I was very suspicious when Ant-Man was announced. Who actually gave a chicken-shit about Ant-Man? However my mind changed once I learned Edgar Wright was one of the writers. I've liked his style so, you know, even if Ant-Man had been total rubbish, at least there was some skillful writing - not just from Wright.

The most distinct thing about Ant-Man is how much simpler it is compared to the massive Avengers franchise. The story is simple, mostly revolving around a heist instead of some huge, epic fight that will cause millions of dollars worth of damage to the cities. It's simple, yet still interesting enough to watch.

Another special thing about Ant-Man is how much more relaxed it seems. There's no giant need to make it super serious and stuff a lot of philosophical pondering in there, which usually does go to total waste when it comes to superhero movies. Ant-Man is an action comedy, and it usually manages to make even the most important fights quite funny in rather easy ways. Ant-Man does a way better job at making the situation lighter than, say, Avengers: Age of Ultron, where they just zing kind of cheesy one-liners here and there to get cheap laughs from the audience. Could it be because writers of Avengers are working under this huge pressure and they can't really enjoy themselves, while reaction to Ant-Man being announced was pretty much "Why the fuck would you make this movie?"

Of course there are annoyances, which are too common with any superhero movies, and they get recycled over and over again. There's that unnecessary romance, predictable structure, but what's most annoying to me is you can't really watch a Marvel movie unless you've seen like at least three others. I'd love to be able to watch Ant-Man as Ant-Man, because it's actually funny movie, but there's hint to movies I haven't seen, and I don't want to watch. This is the biggest problem with the franchise system - you can't just watch movies individually. Like sure I wouldn't watch Iron Man 3 without seeing the first two, but like this is the first Ant-Man movie and still I have to know so much? It's a buzzkill.

All in all Ant-Man is a very entertaining movie, but it has the same flaws every superhero movie has. Thankfully though it's hilarious and way more relaxed than any other superhero movie I've seen - apart from Deadpool, of course.

☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆
8 / 10

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