Starring: Ryan Reynolds, Blake Lively, Peter Sarsgaard, Tim Robbins, Angela Bassett and Mark Strong
Directed By: Martin Campbell
Story By: Greg Berlanti, Michael Green and Marc Guggenheim
Screenplay By: Greg Berlanti, Michael Green, Marc Guggenheim and Michael Goldenberg
Produced By: Donald De Line and Greg Berlanti
Distributor: Warner Bros.
Rating: PG-13
Running Time: Approximately 105 minutes
Website: greenlanternmovie.warnerbros.com
Budget: $200 million
Genre: Action
Release Date: June 17, 2011
As far as superhero comic books go, there’s really only two major producers: longtime rivals Marvel and DC. There are any number of successful outliers, but for decades, their publishing rivalry has been the engine of the comic book world, or at least the mainstream, spandex-centric part of it. After Marvel has had varying degrees of success with its movie adaptations – X-Men, Spider-Man, Hulk, Thor – it was only a matter of time before DC and Time-Warner, its parent company, tried to expand their filmic universe beyond proven icons like Superman and Batman. The rivalry continues, just off the page and onto celluloid.
Based on the DC Comics mainstay, Green Lantern follows Hal Jordan (The Proposal’s Ryan Reynolds), a cocky test pilot chosen by crashed alien Abin Sur to wield a power ring whose capabilities are limited only by the user’s willpower and imagination. Though evidently the most irresponsible person ever to be entrusted with multi-million dollar machinery, Jordan is deemed worthy of carrying on the dying alien’s legacy. It turns out Sur was part of the Green Lantern Corps, an intergalactic police force whose rings channel the “green energy” of willpower through a lantern-shaped battery located in deep space, allowing them to fly, create constructs out of energy, and – as their oft-repeated oath reminds us – let no evil escape their sight. There are thousands of alien “police officers” in the GLC, and Hal Jordan is the first human charged with this duty – much to the consternation of fellow Lanterns like the not-at-all-suspiciously-named Sinestro (Mark Strong of Sherlock Holmes).
Reluctant to embrace his new responsibility, Jordan instead wrestles with his feelings of inadequacy and longs for his pretty boss at Ferris Aircraft, Carol (Blake Lively of TV’s “Gossip Girl”). Back on Earth, Jordan is drawn into the machinations of the ambitious Senator Hammond (Tim Robbins) and his scientist son, Hector (Peter Sarsgaard, in full creep mode), who have found Abin Sur’s body and promptly performed experiments on it. As Hammond quickly spirals out of control, Jordan is forced to confront his fear as a threat from Abin Sur’s past comes to Earth looking for revenge on Sur’s successor and the Green Lantern Corps.
There’s a lot of the familiar in Green Lantern, most immediately recognizable from recent superhero epics. Hal’s journey from jerk to hero was more vividly portrayed by Robert Downey, Jr. in Iron Man, while the dynamic between Jordan, Carol, Hector and the senator is a direct rip of the Peter-Mary Jane-Osborns relationship in Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man films. Possibly symptomatic of its passel of screenwriters, Green Lantern grafts any number of superhero tropes onto the cipher-like Hal Jordan in hopes something will stick: childhood trauma (his father, also a pilot, died in front of him); unfulfilled desires for his childhood sweetheart; even an adoring moppet of a nephew that idolizes Hal (one of several underdeveloped sub-plots). Reynolds, shedding much of his comic persona for the role, has the necessary swagger and emotion, but is let down by half-baked plotting. Of the rest of the cast, Lively is easily the weak link, looking very much like the fashionable teen she plays on TV when we’re supposed to accept her as the heir apparent to an aerospace empire.
If Green Lantern’s earthbound side makes for occasionally frustrating viewing, it excels once Jordan takes off into space for his training and induction. The comics have always had a rich mythology, and the movie does a good job of putting a lot of the nuts and bolts of the sprawling Green Lantern saga on screen. Oa, homeworld of the Green Lantern Corps, is breathtaking, as is the Corps itself, a vast mob of computer generated-aliens bathed in green uniforms. Though I still think the “Everything’s 3D!” trend is a silly one, the green light “constructs” of the rings look impressive in 3D. Comic favorites like the Corps’ “drill sergeant” Kilowog (voice of Michael Clarke Duncan) and Tomar Re (voice of Geoffrey Rush, called on to do the now-standard expository voiceover) make appearances and distinguish themselves from the alien throng. Strong’s Sinestro is suitably charismatic and understandably distrustful of Sur’s successor (though a post-credits scene in which he appears is largely unmotivated, it will be instantly recognizable to fans of the comics). Embracing what makes it unique is where Green Lantern distinguishes itself as a movie; leaving the baggage of Earthbound drama behind frees both the film and Hal up considerably. Where the movie hems and haws its way through its shakily constructed sequences on Earth, it becomes confident in its own concept when it reaches the stars.
There are plenty of literal and figurative Earthbound superheroes in film today. Conventional wisdom has, somewhat erroneously, attributed the Marvel characters to be more “real” than their DC counterparts. The desire to make these characters relatable and still superheroic at the same time is a delicate balancing act, but Green Lantern second-guesses itself and turns its greatest strength – doing things that the movie versions of characters like Spider-Man and Iron Man can’t – into a liability. There are pieces of a great Green Lantern movie scattered throughout this one, and it’s enough to make an entertaining initial foray into science fiction heroics. DC might have hoped for more from a potential franchise-starter, but the good narrowly outweighs the bad and leaves enough promise that it will be interesting to see where Green Lantern goes from here. The best of this recent resurgence of superhero movies leaves you invested, the worst leave you disgusted. Some, like this one, leave you merely diverted.
2.5 Stars
