SOGGY SUPERHERO
Aquaman film fails to thrill
It was only about 20 minutes into Aquaman that I heard the unmistakable sound of a movie taking on water. And soon after that it became clear that no amount of bailing by the stars would save DC’S latest superhero extravaganza over the next two hours. Titanic didn’t go down this fast.
Jason Momoa as Arthur Curry/ Aquaman tries his best, although director James Wan (Saw, Furious 7) seems intent on quashing the actor’s natural sense of humour every time it struggles to show itself. Amber Heard as Mera, emissary of the ocean, is also game, but she’s fighting the soundtrack, which includes weird snippets of Roy Orbison’s She’s a Mystery to Me, and an even more bizarre cover of Toto’s Africa by Pitbull, which plays over a scene in the Sahara desert.
Then again, casting the film’s music as a villain isn’t a bad idea when the movie’s actual bad guys are so thin. There’s Yahya Abdul-mateen II as Manta, a pirate who’s out to avenge the death of his father. Unfortunately, his bug-eyed helmet makes him sound like a bad Darth Vader impersonator. Also, he disappears for so long mid-movie that I almost forgot he was part of the story.
The other miscreant of note is Patrick Wilson as King Orm, Aquaman’s half brother, who keeps making speeches about his “bastard” rival for the throne of Atlantis. It all sounds vaguely Shakespearean, but I’m here to inform the four credited writers that, even combined, they are no Shakespeare. They’re not even sharp enough to be harpoon-speare.
The story is a globe-hopping quest for a magical trident that will allow Aquaman to claim leadership of all the dwellers of the sea, and thus thwart Orm’s plan to wage war against we landlubbers who have been polluting the oceans, overfishing and wearing inappropriate swimming attire for too long. It starts with a secret message that can no longer be deciphered — imagine you had vinyl but no phonograph, or a text document in the form of an old Clarisworks file.
Thus the trip to the Sahara to find a dusty Victrola of sorts, after which Aquaman and Mera head to Sicily, which is shot like a tourist advertisement. Meanwhile, King Orm is busy rounding up allies from a dizzying number of undersea kingdoms, each with its own ruler, army, beasties and architecture. Imagine a First World War adventure story that spent half its time explaining the bureaucracy behind the League of Nations.
That first 20 minutes, which seems so long ago now, makes for an exciting beginning. We learn how Aquaman’s parents — played by Nicole Kidman and Temuera Morrison — first met, and Kidman gets a nice fight scene, shot in a single take. Alas, the rest of the movie is a plodding one-two of conversations interrupted by marauding aqua-troops, who are easy to fight on land because if you smash their helmets they “drown” in our atmosphere.
The sea-folk include Willem Dafoe as Aquaman’s friend and mentor, and Dolph Lundgren as King Nereus. They look good, no doubt because filming underwater takes 10 years off your face. And while Aquaman and Mera are clearly being thrown together by the screenplay — into a celebrity super-couple named Aquamera, I suppose — the two actors have as much onscreen chemistry as oil and water.
That’s a worrisome metaphor when you consider the setting of the film. The last thing you want of Aquaman is for him to be out of his element.