Hancock (2008)

Links: IMDb * Wikipedia * AllMovie * Rotten Tomatoes

Premise: A washed-up superhero reforms himself with the aid of a public relations agent.

Stars: Will Smith * Jason Bateman * Charlize Theron

Review: As everyone else notes in their reviews of this movie, this could've been an excellent deconstructionist take on the superhero movies - and in the summer of Iron Man, The Incredible Hulk, Hellboy II, and The Dark Knight what a coup that could've been.

Peter Berg's The Kingdom was excellent. The Rundown is a movie I still repeatedly watch. Friday Night Lights was good, but not a standout high school football movie.

Add in Will Smith, and it should be a no-brainer.

But what the two concocted is horrible. There's no single coherent plot throughout the movie. (Which can probably be blamed on the five years of development hell prior to its release.)

Plot 1: Drunk superhero gets a makeover
Plot 2: Drunk superhero is alone in the world and rejects it as it rejects him. He makes friends and works to improve.
Plot 3: Drunk superhero is one of a pair of angels/demigods/gods with the other being his wife who left him 80 years earlier after a vicious attack by humans.
Plot 4: Drunk superhero is a god who lives among people and is supposed to protect them. He was created simultaneously with a partner that his supposed to join him in life, make him mortal and allow him to experience life after millenia living as their protector.
Plot 5: PR man who believes in a charity he's attempting to create that will heal the world meets a drunken superhero. PR man has a hot wife who gives the drunk superhero odd looks.
Plot 6: A hidden society of god-killers has been working to eliminate them all and only two remain, a drunk amnesiac and one that remains hidden.
Plot 7: A housewife with a hidden secret has her former lover reappear in her life, threatening to expose her to her new family.

Honestly, any one of these plots could've been a great center of a movie if the other six - and I believe there are more I could write up - did not continuously show up and distract. Not only that, there are hints and lines that would serve to increase a layered back story, but they're all hit and miss - a line during the showdown and constantly referring to 'they' serve as remnants of a backstory that could've really taken this movie to another level.

The special effects are poor to mediocre. A hellish, freakish storm appears in downtown LA and does no damage - the damage comes from the combat between the two superheroes. When the superheroes are around each other, there's supposed to be heat - it is apparent in two scenes, but not in several others where they are together. Honestly, if a man's head is shoved up another's ass a) the insertee would be in the hospital for months b) the inserted would be dead of asphyxia in minutes. The constant screaming near the end - Theron and Smith - goes on way too long.

This movie could've been so much more. As it is, it's a waste.

Overall: Bad