A One Mann’s Movies review of “The Marvels” (2023).
“The Marvels” seems to have crept into cinemas with relatively little fanfare for a $250 million film. As if Marvel seem a bit embarrassed about it and have already filed it in the “failure” bucket. But this feels more than premature, since the characters here have a lot of appeal, particularly with the proportion of the audience that can identify with the ‘girl-power’ on show here. That is in fact both in-front of as well as behind the camera!
Bob the Movie Man Rating:
Plot Summary:
After a disruption to the inter-galactic ‘jump points’ caused by Kree leader Dar-Benn (Zawe Ashton), Carol Danvers (aka Captain Marvel) (Brie Larson) finds that she swaps places with Kamala Khan (aka Ms Marvel) (Iman Vellani) and/or Monica Rambeau (aka… nothing at the moment!) (Teyonah Parris) whenever any of them use their super-powers.
Certification:
UK: 12; US: PG-13; (From the BBFC website: “Moderate fantasy violence”).
Talent:
Starring: Brie Larson, Iman Vellani, Teyonah Parris, Samuel L. Jackson, Zawe Ashton, Park Seo-joon, Zenobia Shroff, Mohan Kapur, Saagar Shaikh.
Directed by: Nia DaCosta.
Written by: Nia DaCosta, Megan McDonnell & Elissa Karasik.
Twitter Handle: #TheMarvels.
Running Time: 1h 45m.
Kamala Khan (Iman Vellani) breathes energy and humour into the film. (Source: Marvel Studios).
“The Marvels” Review:
Positives:
- At 1 hour and 45 minutes, this takes the record as the shortest Marvel film of all time, beating the previous shortest (“The Incredible Hulk” and “Thor: The Dark World”) by 7 minutes. What a delight that a piece of super-hero storytelling can be slotted into a sensible run-time.
- There’s a nice chemistry developed between the three leads. The rather icy and imperious Carol Danvers is taught empathy at one point by her young protege! And the sort of fan-worship of Danvers by Kamala is neatly portrayed: the look of sheer horror on Larson’s face when she first crash-lands in the 16-year-old’s bedroom is fantastic! Iman Vellani really owns this, making Kamala Khan a really human character, excitable and wondrous in equal measure. I never got to watch “Ms Marvel”, but this performance made me want to pick it up.
- There is a lot of action packed into the 105 minutes of run-time but also a lot of great humour. One sequence, set on the ocean planet of Aladna where the culture involved song and dance, is particularly amusing.
Monica: “How many ideas for Marvel fan fiction is this giving you?”
Kamala: Sooooo many.
(On watching Captain Marvel in a revealing outfit dancing with Prince Yan.)
- The ‘inter-switching training’ scene is also fun. But the best belly laugh of the film comes in a sequence set to Barbra Streisand singing “Memory”. Very amusing indeed and a big plus for cat-lovers everywhere.
- The dynamic within the Khan family is nicely portrayed. It reminded me of the similar positive vibe I had about the Reyes family in DC’s “Blue Beetle“.
- I enjoyed the music score by Laura Karpman.
Negatives:
- The pace is frenetic – too frenetic. I felt there is rather too much plot shoe-horned into the running time to keep up. And a lot of it didn’t seem to flow well, as if whole sections of plot had ended up on the cutting room floor. The strategy of Dar-Benn (albeit far-fetched) seemed sound, but a lot of the surrounding action and events seem to get thrown at you with a “oh, make it quick and they’ll never notice” attitude. For example, at one point, Rambeau and Khan “flash” and are standing before Dar-Benn but it’s not clear how or why.
- We move on from stuff so quickly. Danvers seems very concerned about the planet Hala, but we never see what happened to Prince Yan (Park Seo-joon) and the planet Aladna.
- The fact that this film blends the streams for film and TV works feels dangerous for Marvel. Yes, it won’t be a concern for the Marvel super-fans who have avidly watched everything. But for other folks (like me) that have grazed on the TV offerings, the fact that two out of the three lead characters have come from TV shows that they might not have seen may put people off. (For the record, I’ve watched the wonderful Wandavision (which shows how Monica Rambeau got her powers) but not Ms Marvel (which shows the backstory of Kamala Khan)). The film tries to quickly fill in the gaps at the start with a neat (and very amusing) animated comic book sequence. But even with this, non-Marvelites might feel like they are attending a black-tie party wearing fancy dress. (Or, perhaps actually, the other way round!)
The villain of the piece, Dar-Benn (Zawe Ashton) with her Thor-style magic hammer! (Source: Marvel Studios)
Monkeys?
There is a good mid-credit monkey but – surprisingly for a Marvel film – no end-credit monkey. Just some kitty-cat noises over the Marvel logo. So you really don’t need to sit through all the credits!
Summary Thoughts on “The Marvels”
You have to respect the amount of positive discrimination shown here in terms of female crew (assuming, of course, that they all do identify as female in these complicated days!) A female director (the first black female – indeed person of colour at all? – to direct a Marvel film); female writers; three female leads; even a female composer. Real girl-power behind the camera!
I um’d and ah’d over my rating for this one. I was at a 3*s at one point but in writing this review I have upped it to 3.5*s. It was fun. I enjoyed it, particularly some of the excellent comedy sections. But, with my other head on, it feels a bit of a jumbled, over-hurried mess. I LIKED the short running time. But perhaps it needed less plot and for this to be a “part 1 of 2”.
Where to Watch it (Powered by Justwatch)
Trailer for “The Marvels”:
The trailer is here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iuk77TjvfmE .
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