Checked out the early Thursday screening of DC’s new villain ensemble superhero flick Suicide Squad. Movie has been getting some very bad reviews that seem to be centered on a confused tone… and I’m here to say it’s a bit messy but not a disaster. The tonal issues referred to, I think, are only in the first (messy) thirty minutes of the movie. When it settles down into the action movie that it wants to be, it’s a pretty consistent (and pretty good) flick. So I think I disagree with a lot of the pros on this one.
I just hope I’m not delusional.
The first thirty minutes are the “Getting the gang together” sequence where the government picks and chooses the “worst of the worst” villains to form one of them there suicide squads (a group who can get the job done when it needs to be done off the books). And it is sloppy, poorly edited, and rushed – yet another movie this year that feels like it has been chopped up in editing (even some sequences in the later, better part of the movie have some problems like this). For example, there’s two briefing scenes where the mastermind of the squad tells military brass about her plan. Then there’s at least two scenes where each villain/hero is introduced and yet another where they are inducted into the team. Some of them get disjointed flashbacks involving Batman (as played briefly by Ben Affleck) or The Joker but others are just slammed into the movie with barely a mention.
But, surprisingly, there are some legitimately character-driven scenes, once you get past the perfunctory/messy intros. Specifically, Deadshot (Will Smith), Harlie Quinn (Margot Robbie), , pyromaniac Diablo (Jay Hernandez), and government agent Rick Flag (Joel Kinnnaman) have their own, in my estimation, pretty emotional stories and backstories. I was surprised when the film would take a breather and have actually character-driven scenes (even if some of the flashbacks seemed randomly inserted). Even more surprised when I was interested in them.
And speaking of the cast in general, Will Smith is his usual good self. Margot Robbie as Harlie Quinn seems to have had a character change once the story launches – she seems very different in the getting-the-team-together thing than she does once in action (she seems more herself later in the film). Jared Leto’s joker I’m unsure about – sometimes he was good, other times he was trying too hard (but he’s not a major player so maybe that’s ok). Other characters like the Australian Captain Boomerang is, frankly, a dude who throws boomerangs and makes wisecracks. Pass. And Killer Croc, I noticed at the very end, is Cajun. So oops on them or oops on me for not understanding his incomprehensible growl.
Oh, and there’s a very good soundtrack to the movie – or at least in the first 30 minutes. In fact, the soundtrack is so good it becomes a little on-the-nose and starts to interfere with the stuff on screen. This may, in fact, be where some of the studio interference came into play since the trailers made such good use of songs (apparently the trailer editors had a pass at the movie – thus a good but super in-your-face use of pop, rock, and rap songs).
The basic plot is a semi-interesting villain has taken over a major city and our heroes have to work their way to the center of the madness (taking some detours on the way). The villain’s goals are kind of vague and the army of non-descript monsters pretty nebulous… there’s a giant swirling blue vortex in the sky like a lot of superhero movies seem to end up with. It’s not a great story but it’s more the story of the Suicide Squad anyway. Though there’s is an emotional tie between the villain and one of the heroes that I thought, ultimately and surprisingly, worked.
So, yeah, I liked this movie. I wish the first thirty minutes had been better and I’d be interested in seeing the original cut of the film before the studio (apparently) went on an editing tear. But I felt the majority of the film didn’t suffer from a rush or hatchet job and it hung together well. The action was pretty well done and usually pretty clear and comprehensible. It had a sense of humor but it wasn’t the joke-fest I was thinking it was going to be (based on the studio interference stories).
So, yeah, maybe I’m just delusional.
Score: 86