High-Concept 'Hancock' Falls Flat
By Todd McCarthy, Variety.com
An intriguing high concept is undermined by low-grade dramaturgy in "Hancock." This misguided attempt to wring a novel twist on the superhero genre has a certain whiff of "The Last Action Hero" about it, with Will Smith playing an indestructible crime-buster in a pointedly real-world context. Although it will inevitably open very large, this odd and perplexing aspiring tent pole will provide a real test of Smith's box-office invincibility.
The central idea of Vy Vincent Ngo and Vince Gilligan's script -- of Smith's John Hancock being an ornery, unwilling hero who escapes from his ordained role in life via booze and general cantankerousness -- is amusing and plausible enough to sustain the first section of the film. What the writers and director Peter Berg do with the concept in the end, however, is nowhere near sufficiently thought out, and narrative illogic and missed opportunities plague the film increasingly as it cartwheels through its surprisingly brief running time.
When the world-famous Hancock reluctantly swings into action -- he can fly at supersonic speed, lift any weight and is impervious to all weapons -- his drunken recklessness invariably causes more damage than it's worth. Although valuable to the police, Hancock has a bad name with the public for his destructiveness, impudence and all-around bad attitude; an adjunct to this is his foul language, which treads the very edge of PG-13 permissiveness and will no doubt catch many kid-herding parents unhappily unaware.
Much in need of rehab, the raggedly attired Hancock finds an eager savior in PR whiz Ray Embrey (Jason Bateman). Rescued from certain death by the rasty hero, Ray returns the favor by inviting him to dinner with wife Mary (Charlize Theron) and son Aaron (Jae Head) and announcing he's going to remake Hancock's image. The strongman's first step will be to submit to rehab and anger-management training, along with some prison time (although Hancock resists wearing an actual superhero outfit because it's too "homo"). What he shortly does to two tough-talking inmates in the pen crudely literalizes the taunt about sticking your head where the sun don't shine.
Such vulgar goofiness is one thing in an Adam Sandler film, but doesn't sit well in the rough-and-ready realism of Berg's raw visuals, which grievously misapply hand-held jitteriness to material that demands more precise stylization.
The genre satire and numerous Smith moments, with the star throwing off the attitude-laden quips and looks audiences expect from him, carry the first half without too much trouble, in anticipation of where the film will go from there.
Where it goes, unfortunately, is right down the tubes. All along, there's something oddly hostile about Mary's attitude toward Hancock, and, at the 55-minute mark, a major revelation sends the story veering off into territory that feels unmapped even in the minds of the filmmakers. All the potential the premise seemed to offer is frittered away, mind-boggling gaps of logic come to the fore, and arbitrary plot devices serve to shortchange a story that could have gone in much more interesting directions.
Even in his derelict state, why would the presumably superstudly Hancock have no lady friends? Why would humiliated criminals ever think they could strike back at their nemesis? More broadly speaking, what about an invincible superhero who could take power into his own hands and become a self-appointed dictator who arbitrates on good and evil, sometimes to ill effect? Putting a character like Hancock in the recognizable modern world, rather than in a cartoonish context, creates all sorts of possibilities that are willfully ignored by the filmmakers, who instead have come up with a concoction that is both overwrought and severely undernourished.
That said, the effects are snazzy, even if they pass by quite quickly, and there's enough going on to keep audiences watching, if not entirely happy. Smith, Theron and Bateman capably handle the main roles, but such is the skimpiness of the scenario that no further characters make any impact.
The guy has owned Fourth of July weekends with huge debuts for some passable but not-so-great movies ("Independence Day," "Men in Black II"), and he'll likely do it again with this foul-mouthed-misanthrope-as-superhero flick.
"Hancock" has a crisp, entertaining set-up ? Smith as a superhero who hates everyone and is hated in turn for the chaos he causes. With nowhere to go after that, the filmmakers let the story devolve into a lame variation of the very action genre they aimed to flip on its head.
But none of that matters. It's Will Smith and it's another passable movie, largely because he IS Will Smith.
Los Angeles may loathe their resident dude with superpowers, but Smith makes you love him, from the moment he wakes up on a bus bench, surly and hungover, and snaps crabbily at the little kid who roused him with the simple call to arms, "Hancock? Bad guys?"
Smith is the closest to a sure thing Hollywood has, the most likable, bankable star around. He can score hits out of a drama about a homeless dad ("The Pursuit of Happyness") or an end-of-the-world saga released at Christmas time ("I Am Legend") as easily as he can with standard summer fare such as "Bad Boys II."
Because Smith inspires such kinship, you wish "Hancock" director Peter Berg and screenwriters Vy Vincent Ngo and Vince Gilligan had provided better material to let him show off his charm.
The movie opens with great promise, offering a solid action sequence blended with a nice character study. Smith's Hancock, a man with no memory of his past before waking up with superpowers in a hospital 80 years earlier, grudgingly puts his gifts to work again, stopping thugs in a high-speed shootout with police.
He does it in typical Hancock style, with no regard for public safety and causing millions in property damage, to the point that authorities gripe publicly that he should go "help" some other city for a while.
A loner who looks and smells more like a homeless guy than a hero, Hancock goes about his job with a sense of drudgery. He can't stand his life, he couldn't care less about the people he saves and the idea of disguising his identity would be as laughable to him as actually dressing the part in a fancy superhero suit.
One day, he steps in and indifferently rescues earnest public-relations man Ray Embrey (Jason Bateman), who surprises Hancock by actually thanking him, profusely.
Ray takes it on himself to do an image-makeover for Hancock, convincing him to try behaving like a hero so the public will see him that way. That means putting on a slick superhero costume instead of his usual rags and applying finesse to his powers, which include flying that usually ends with landings so hard they pulverize the pavement.
"Landing is your superhero handshake," Ray tells Hancock. "Don't come in too hot, don't come in too boozy, and don't land on the $100,000 Mercedes."
Ray's wife, Mary (Charlize Theron), thinks it's all a bad idea, wishing Hancock would stay out of their lives.
"Hancock" seems to be charting fresh, smart territory amid Hollywood's formulaic superhero tales. It's amusing and touching to see the awkward kernels of humanity Smith's character reveals as he tries to treat people with respect and decency, and people respond with the same toward him.
Then, the filmmakers cannot resist embracing the conventions they were tweaking. "Hancock" turns from a moody, darkly funny character piece trimmed out with a bit of engaging action and veers into a poor impersonation of a standard superhero movie.
A plot twist that's not very surprising reveals details of Hancock's past, the movie laying out a limp backstory that the most insignificant of comic books could best in terms of superhero "mythology."
After that, "Hancock" is mostly bruising action, the sequences sturdy but unspectacular.
Smith always is fun to watch, though he becomes less interesting as Hancock loses his rough edges and turns into your regular old hero at large. Bateman's puppy-dog optimism is a fine complement, and Theron manages to maintain credibility in a sloppily concocted role that forces her to make schizophrenic character shifts.
The surprisingly brisk running time speaks to the scrawniness of the story and drama. "Hancock" is a fine idea that dead-ends in an empty alley, and all Berg and company can do is have a standard-issue costumed crusader come bounding back out to save the day.
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I saw Will Smiths last two movies and they sucked. I actually slept through the homeless guy one. And that last end of the earth one just didnt do it for me.
I think Will Smith is in the Eddie Murphy segment of his movie career. The one where it goes downhill fast.
