Captain Marvel deserves more
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play into the pilot side?
I guess so because, for the most part, pilots are on their own. But the thing that I found so unique in Carol was her sense of humour mixed with hyper intelligence and total capability in whatever challenge comes her way. I realised after going to the Air Force base that the Air Force pilots are like that too. So the spirit of her or the core of her is the Air Force.
How did the flight training go?
Oh, I puked a lot. That’s part of how I got my call sign. All of the pilots were like you’re not supposed to tell anybody that, and I was like I got no shame. But we were simulating a dog fight, so I was like flipping around all which way. My pilot was so incredible and super-talented. We got to 6.5 Gs. It was just amazing to feel all of that, especially once we were back on set. When we were simulating a barrel roll, I was able to recall that exactly, what that feels like, what your body feels like, how hard it is to breathe. It’s all of those little nuances that I hope will come through in the movie so that regardless of who you are, if you’re the Air Force or you’re a pilot or whatever, that you recognise that. That it feels real. Brie Larson in
On Starforce and Skrull
“Starforce is this elite group within the Kree army. They’re like a Special Forces team. They all have a special set of skills, and together they make this elite squad that is quite cohesive. They have a great familiarity with one another. They are brothers and sisters in arms. But you do notice that Carol is a little bit of an outsider because you just wouldn’t be Carol unless you were an outsider. So there’s a bit of a push and pull that you don’t quite understand, but then it pays off later. The Skrulls are shapeshifting aliens. They sim their host, but they can only sim recent memories, so they only have a short amount of info, which is part of how you can find out if they’re a Skrull or not.”
On Carol’s relationship with Nick Fury
“Carol and Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson) do not start off on the same page at all. They’re both at war and don’t understand each other very much. But it’s actually that conflict that brings out their sense of humour, which is sort of the beginning of realising that they have things in common. Then they team up together and are able to utilise both of their skill sets together. They complement each other very well.”
If there is one thing that’s true of most of the movies in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, it’s that they have life and spirit to spare. It’s a kind of an intoxicating joy that dares even the most comic book-apathetic to get onboard and delight in the spectacle, and it usually comes down to the characters. You might not care about whatever Earth-threatening foe is at large this time, but you care about Captain America, Black Panther and Black Widow and enjoy spending a few hours with them.
I spent over two hours with Captain Marvel/carol Danvers and I still have no idea what her personality is. Sure, there’s a lot more going on in Captain Marvel, but it’s a pretty egregious failing considering that the creative bigwigs at Marvel had 10 years and 20 films to work it out. It’s hard to say whether that’s a flaw in Brie Larson’s performance or a failure of the script, but I came out of the film not caring all that much about her beyond what her dazzling powers might mean for the next Avengers film, which is perhaps the lamest way to experience these films.
The story drops you in the middle of things and gives Carol Danvers a convenient case of amnesia as she tries to piece together her past by dreaming of Annette Bening while training to be a soldier with Jude Law on the planet of Kree. She is told at least 10 times in the first 10 minutes of the film that she needs to control her emotions, mostly by Law. This is a charged thing to say to a woman, but also confusing because “emotional” is the last word I would use to describe the character as she’s presented. She’s more impulsive and bullheaded than anything else.
The film is meant to be disorienting, especially at the beginning. But things start to come together when she crash-lands on Earth somewhere around 1995. In LA, she comes across a young Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson), whose infectious liveliness is a godsend. Together they try to both track down shapeshifting alien invaders called the Skrulls (led by Ben Mendelsohn) and also get answers about her past. But this is the origin story they went with and it does not include Bening teaching Larson how to fly a fighter plane.
There are some twists and turns and a scene-stealing orange cat that would be difficult to discuss here without spoiling everything. All-in-all it’s fine, but nothing to get too excited about. And it could have and should have been so much better: The cast was there, the cool directing talents, the budget and the “brand” goodwill. The first female-led movie of the MCU surely deserved more.
CAPTAIN MARVEL
Brie Larson, Jude Law, Samuel L. Jackson Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck
Cast: Director: