Guardians Of The Galaxy
And bringing it to a close after the first and second parts, the top ten best comic book based movies worth talking about!
10. Blade – This was the first good movie based on a Marvel comic after many dismal, poorly directed and under-funded adaptations in previous decades. This one had a legit martial artist and charismatic badass in Wesley Snipes who could handle the Hong Kong fantasy styles infused into the Blade character’s battle against vampires who didn’t sparkle. This in turn led more production companies to see what could happen when you actually put viable resources and appropriate talents behind a comic based story as the explosion of decent works over the last 15 years like X-Men, Spider-Man, and Iron Man can be traced to this film.
9. X2: X-Men United – I was debating with myself which of the X-films to put into the main list but in the end, only one movie actually had Cyclops, Jean Grey, Storm, Nightcrawler, Wolverine, Iceman, Colossus and Rogue (with a cameo from The Beast no less) all actually get to do something. Bryan Singer’s second entry into the Marvel mutantverse took what came before in the previous X-Men film and built up both characters and the ante. The script had a perfect setup utilizing the characters toward an ending no one saw coming, but had long time X-Men fans seriously anticipating the third chapter. There’s Wolverine (Hugh Jackman) trying to regain his memory because of a guy named Stryker (Bryan Cox) who uses a White House attack by the teleporter Nightcrawler (Alan Cumming) as a pretext to invade the school of Professor Xavier (Patrick Stewart) and destroy all mutants. Stryker’s plan involves Magneto (Sir Ian McKellen) who wants to prevent this and may or may not have an agenda all his own. There’s also the development of the kids at the school like Colossus who become better over time with their powers and likely will develop into full X Men. It’s great to see Storm (Halle Berry) and Jean Grey (Famke Jansen) kick butt more proactively than in the first film, and Mystique (Rebecca Romjin) was sexy and fun. Overall, there were good uses of powers by original X-Men like Cyclops as well as the emerging students such as Pyro and Iceman, whose rivalry develops big time. In the end though, seeing McKellen, Stewart and Cox give weight to their characters anchors a very solid film so that the action around them becomes more compelling.
8. Guardians of the Galaxy – This was one of the biggest surprises of 2014. It proves that one can take a group of relatively unknown misfits and create something special to join an ever expanding Marvel Universe. Outside of the most hardcore of comic readership, many hadn’t heard of Star Lord, Rocket and the like. They weren’t readily available as cartoons or toys over the many years. So this was a huge gamble that Kevin Feige plotted for Marvel films and it worked wonders with director James Gunn and screenwriter Nicole Perlman pulled off something that no one expected entirely to be as big as it was, while introducing the cosmic aspects of Marvel largely based on writings by Dan Abnett, Andy Lanning and Jim Starlin. Add in a dose of fun nostalgia for soundtrack and some genuinely funny touches and eycatches, as well as lead actor Chris Pratt’s comedic timing (not to mention surprising performances from Dave Bautitsta and Zoe Saldanna) and yeah… very successful starting point for this crew. They are Groot!
7. A History of Violence – Although rather different than its source material, this movie is no less impactful due to hard hitting yet naturalistic style of director David Cronenberg. It begins with Viggo Mortensen being a regular guy named Tom running his diner with his wife Maria Bello. After stopping robbers at his restaurant someone comes along and indicates Tom has always been good at killing. As things become clearer and characters such as Carl (Ed Harris) and later, a crime boss named Richie (William Hurt) start to appear, it becomes clear there’s no easy solution that can result in a happy life afterward. There are violent scenes but they’re shot realistically so that the acts aren’t glorified. Can a man go from one extreme of life to the other successfully? This movie examines the nature of violence and how infectious it can be similarly to Sam Peckinpah’s ‘The Getaway.’ Also the story ends in the correct spot to make one contemplate the future of these characters.
6. Road To Perdition – Director Sam Mendes created excellent tension and action in this dramatic adaptation of Max Allen Collins prohibition-era revenge comic. Done similarly to the manga Lone Wolf & Cub we see an assassin known as “The Angel of Death” Michael O’Sullivan (Tom Hanks) who must get the only kind of justice he can against his crime boss Mr. Rooney (Paul Newman) whose son Connor (Daniel Craig) tries to murder the entire O’Sullivan family because Michael’s son witnessed Connor committing violent act. Michael must protect his only remaining son and fight off whatever loyalty he might’ve had to the elder Rooney and his organization, who hire an oddball hitman (Jude Law) to take out Michael. Excellent performances all around, but this should be no surprise if you’ve seen American Beauty or Skyfall (for which Mendes and Craig teamed up again.)
5. Watchmen: Director’s Cut – Zack Snyder’s other really good comic book to movie effort, though initially the theatrical cut wasn’t quite as good. As a fan of Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons’s deconstruction of super heroes on an alternate Earth set in the 1980s, it was great seeing this movie adapted for the big screen. However for many years since the comic’s release, it was speculated and often concluded the only way to bring this story to any motion medium would be either as a mini-series capturing every single nuance, or…. well, not at all. Many concluded it simply wasn’t a good idea to try. The resulting film (and the double studio lawsuit it had to go through) kept most of the essence of the story intact, with a few changes to make the climax more presentable and the story flow better for the screen. The director’s curt though, added some scenes back in that weren’t in the theatrical cut and upon second viewing, the movie became easier to watch and accept. The small additions made things flow better. Even still, there was already an excellently constructed opening sequence and generally good performances from actors who weren’t entirely A-List. Jackie Earle Hayley for example portrayed perfect creepiness as the sociopathic vigilante Rorshach, and made folks want to see him on screen again long after his teen acting days in the Bad News Bears movies. Jeffrey Dean Morgan showed serious sadism as The Comedian, while Billy Cruddup remained perfectly stoic as the god-like being Doctor Manhattan. Actually, just about everyone performed their characters well here, which made the visual effects and art design that much more effective. If the theatrical version is your only experience, it’s definitely worthwhile to look at the director’s cut with fresher eyes. You might just be surprised.
4. Spider-Man 2 – In Sam Raimi’s second installment about the Wall-Crawler, we see Peter Parker still having a difficult life in New York. He’s great at being Spider-Man but he still has troubles just living a life, staying in school and maintaining a secret identity… about like his life in the comics. Mary Jane is getting tired of Peter always being distracted, while Harry Osborn is obsessed with finding and getting revenge on Spider Man for killing is father. We get introduced to Doctor Octopus (brilliantly played by Alfred Molina) being driven insane by his own metal arms which’ve gotten life of their own. The story amps up the best parts of what made the first one good be, but in doctor octopus we get a better and more focused villain (even though Willem Dafoe made a memorable Green Goblin). Peter proves to be his own worst enemy in this movie, which adds to the conflicts Spidey must eventually overcome, emulating the classic “Spider-Man No More” premise. J.K. Simmons continues to be a scene stealer in this movie much like the first one when emulating J. Jonah Jameson perfectly from the comics. Meanwhile, Tobey McGuire remains excellently semi-dorky, yet self-reliant and increasingly more confident, much like the character is in the comic. Even though the recent Amazing Spider-Man movies had better performances by Andrew Garfield and Emma Stone, they still don’t hold up story or direction wise compared to this movie, hence its presence on the main list.
3. Batman: The Dark Knight Trilogy – For some time, filmmakers had tried to emulate the grim elements which became more prevalent in the Batman mythos since Frank Miller’s comic series “The Dark Knight Returns” was published in the mid-80s. However without the focus on other elements such as characterization or story cohesiveness, in addition to deviation from the character to make him blow up a building full of people (that’s a Punisher tactic, not a Batman one), these films only worked up to a point until Christopher Nolan began his trilogy with “Batman Begins,” giving an attention to detail and psychology that had never been written before in a superhero film. Also, the supporting players such as Jim Gordon (Gary Oldman), Alfred the butler (Michael Caine), and Lucius Fox (Morgan Freeman) were fleshed out more than ever on film to compliment the struggles of Bruce Wayne (Christian Bale) becoming a vigilante who remains haunted by the murder of his parents after many years. This resulted in a powerful story when the events of “The Dark Knight” were unleashed on film goers and devastated the characters of this series, including the underrated Harey Dent (Aaron Eckhart). While it definitely had issues, the third installment “The Dark Knight Rises” did serve as a decent resolution to events set forth in “Batman Begins” which is why I’ve placed the trilogy on this list in whole. All the while, Batman’s enemies such as The Joker (Heath Ledger), Bane (Tom Hardy) and Ra’s Al Ghul (Liam Neeson) were largely well-written, excellently portrayed and utilized decently in the storylines, which concluded in an interesting place when all was said and done.
2. Marvel’s The Avengers – The culmination of a grand experiment known as ‘Phase One’ by Paramount Pictures and Marvel Entertainment / Disney. Starting with Iron Man, each individual character was built-up in separate (high quality) movies so they can come together when something overwhelming threatens humanity. The previous films were each pretty good in their own right, but were no guarantee that the assembling of several high profile characters (and their respective actors) would result in one of the best damn collaborations anyone’s ever seen. Writer director Joss Whedon (along with writer Zak Penn) made a definitive statement that comic books can be the inspiration for excellent characterizations and conflict resolutions while giving folks funny dialog to remember at key points throughout. It’s a very big blueprint for Hollywood on how cooperation and listening to comic geek interest can result in profitable fun. People have been reading these characters in comics for decades and they may just have a decent idea on what they want to see on a big screen. Hopefully Age of Ultron and The Infinity War will build positively on this initiative.
1. Superman: The Movie – There are some who say the exploits and ideals of The Last Son of Krypton are outdated because Superman is a noble, honorable character who has tremendous powers, and that it’s impossible to write a compelling story for him either in comics or for the big screen, even though he’s been around for decades and achieved iconic status. Whenever I look at this movie that was the first truly great film focusing on a comic book hero, I see wonderful acting all around from newcomer Christopher Reeve as well as veterans Marlon Brando, Gene Hackman and Glen Ford. I also see a script that places challenges an honorable hero would have to face which could cost him greatly despite his immense powers. In the midst of this, Clark Kent begins a logically progressive romance with Lois Lane (Margot Kidder) that gives this movie much more heart and believability than the clusterf**ked screenplay for Man of Steel. The tag line for this movie was ‘you will believe a man can fly.’ It’s not just the effects though but the presence and emotion brought by these actors that makes that tag credible. Someone told me once that I needed to grow up for placing this movie so high and I just couldn’t help but think, ”Dude, I’m writing about comic book movies…”
So yeah, that’s my list of the best ones out there. Applause, love letters, hate mail, criticisms? Send ‘em on. I love all of it.
PS: Thanks to Ally Pelphrey for helping my fried brain this go around.
