The recent glut of super-hero based movies was bound to produce some clunkers. X-Men and Spider-man both showed how good the genre can be. Daredevil shows just how bad it can be, with poor dialogue, mediocre acting, and moments of pure melodrama.
Daredevil, one of Marvel Comics' less famous heroes, is a nighttime vigilante who protects his chosen turf against all criminals. His turf being the Hell's Kitchen section of New York City. Blinded in a childhood accident, Daredevil's other four senses were enhanced to the superhuman level, granting him extra strength, agility, and an almost radar-like sense. Not above killing to protect the 'innocent', Daredevil does what he can to make the city a safer place, centering most of his efforts against the mysterious "Kingpin", a shadowy figure who controls all of the crime in New York City.
The movie begins with a wounded Daredevil perched atop a church. A good example of what is wrong with this movie. Later, the story flashes back to how he got there, but more on that soon. Suffice to say he was wounded in a fight atop a nearby building. Stabbed and bleeding, our hero takes the time to crawl to the front of the church and cling to a church spire in a picturesque manner that makes for a very stylish opening shot, before climbing down into the church itself. This posing for a quick style shot happens quite often throughout the movie. For a blind man, he certainly understands the value of a good profile, even if he doesn't understand that a stab wound could be better cared for by getting help than by taking the time to pose against a night-scape.
Once inside the church, as he lies 'dying', the Daredevil's life flashes before his eyes. We see how his father used to be a boxer who ran afoul of some criminals. We see how a freak chemical spill caused his blindness. We see how his father is killed and how he swears vengeance. We see how he becomes a lawyer, and we see him grow up and turn out to be Ben Affleck. Very shortly, this mysterious figure becomes absolutely no mystery at all.
In keeping with this 'shove the story into the audience's face', we also quickly learn who the Kingpin (Michael Clarke Duncan) is and his simple motive of blaming all of his crimes upon his partner, after killing him, so that the police will stop suspecting him. It's a good thing the script says he's a criminal genius, otherwise I might not have realized that framing your business partner and confirming to the Police that the City's Criminal Mastermind worked every day in your offices and causing them to search and subpoena all of your records and business papers, was such a good idea.
For the actual killing of his partner, the Kingpin hires Bullseye (Colin Farrell), an Irish murderer who has such good aim that he can kill a man by throwing a straightened paperclip into his windpipe. Forget guns or knives, this guy kills with office supplies.
Meanwhile, Daredevil's alter-ego, the blind lawyer Matt Murdock, falls in love with Elektra Natchios (Jennifer Garner), who just happens to be the daughter of the Kingpin's Partner, and also, of course, a black belt Martial Artist. Her Meeting with Matt, which I guess is supposed to be sexy and exciting as they spar with each other, elicited instead, a laugh from the audience.
The plot moves on, and without giving too much away, a battle takes place between Bullseye and Daredevil and soon we are back in the church with the wounded Daredevil and the movie moves to its inevitable climax.
The shame of this mess of a movie is that it could have been quite good. Ben Affleck has a certain charm and the Daredevil is an intriguingly dark hero, at first. He actually kills, which is a change from the sanitized super-heroes we're used to. Tormented by the constant barrage of sound he is surrounded by, he must sleep in an isolation tank just to block it out. There are times when he seems as insane and as violent as the criminals he fights.
The script however, never lets an intriguing moment get started. Rather than spelling out everything, if they had kept Daredevil in the shadows so to speak and let us discover his secrets more slowly, the movie would have been much better. But instead we are spoon-fed the entire plot from start to finish.
I was even more shocked at just how bad this movie was when I realized that it was written by Brian Helgeland, who also wrote L.A. Confidential and A Knight's Tale.
I wondered before seeing this movie just why such a big super-hero movie would be coming out in February. Now of course, the answer is obvious. Pitted against a slew of good block-busters, Daredevil would have failed miserably. Being the only big movie of the month, it has a chance at least of earning back some of the money wasted on its making.
