Joe Rossi for Curtains Up
I think there is a problem when Viola Davis plays the biggest monster in this film.
I really wanted to like Daivd Ayers Suicide Squad. I really did. After the glum and grim Batman Versus Superman
I felt that DC and Warner Brothers needed to up their game and deliver something that would be memorable and – gasp –fun. They did not. The DC comics universe is a place I do not want to visit. I’d rather watch Gotham on FOX.
I would like to know what the editors were thinking when they stitched this beast together. I believe they wanted mass appeal so they cut, cut, cut their way around the good stuff to make something teenagers can see. Look at Marvel’s winter blockbuster Deadpool. Violent as all hell, vulgar and nasty. And pretty good. That’s because there was no tampering to get a lower rating. It was a hard R and they knew it and stuck by it. Suicide Squad seems like it was taken to a butcher shop and gutted of it’s glorious nasty soul. The film is choppy. Way to too choppy to think that this was what they intended. There is stuff taken out that would explain more and would have made characters that have limited screen time more interesting. If anyone is looking forward to see the great Canadian actor Adam Beach as a DC villain get ready for about 7 minutes of screen time. Probably why he’s left out of the promotional marketing.
For what it’s worth, the first hour is messy but passable. Amanda Waller (Viola Davis), a hardass government type, lets loose a group of DC comic super villains to combat other — super villains — the ones the authorities can’t kill. Included in this merry band are Deadshot, an assassin who never misses. As played by Will Smith, he is the heart of this movie. It’s his meatiest role in years. Playing Harley Quinn, The Joker’s girlfriend, Margot Robbie impresses. She’s 10 levels of crazy and plays it to perfection. As for Jared Leto’s The Joker, the must see performance of the year, don’t blink, you might miss him. He’s good but he’s barely in it. He won’t make me forget Heath Leger anytime soon.
So all of the good stuff is in the set up. Then the second hour begins and the film hits a brick wall at 100 miles an hour and never recovers. For a movie that is supposed to be different, it’s falls into another big by the numbers battle that seems to never end. What a waste because the craft is all there, all 175 million dollars of it. Too bad they didn’t spend much on truly original story and a film editor who is not on Ritalin.
