Wonder Woman (2017)
I’ve been excited for this film for months, perhaps years. And each disappointment from the DC universe has forced me to greater and greater levels of expectation. But the wait was worth it — this is a good film. Go and see it!
Gal Gadot was an inspired choice for the role and her performance in Batman vs Superman was the only thing in that film that I enjoyed. Here she returns to star in her own film without Bruce, Clark and Lex messing things up.
Gadot plays Diana brilliantly. She perfectly displays the excited naivety of the character as she leaves her idyllic Themyscira and heads to war-torn Europe during WW1, and the raw disappointment as her deep-rooted assumptions about humanity and its inherent goodness are challenged, and inevitably broken.
Her fellow Amazonians are ably represented by Connie Nielsen, who I personally haven’t seen since Gladiator, and House of Card’s Robin Wright who each display their love for Diana in completely different ways. They and the other fearless women add a stylised and sinewy strength to their scenes, combat or not and with broad shoulders, tanned bodies and proficiency with all manner of weapons and tactics, they really are the realisation of director Patty Jenkin’s “total wish-fulfilment”.
We meet Chris Pine as the superhero’s sidekick Steve Trevor. He deftly switches between Diana’s guide to the 20th century war zone and taking advantage of her incredible fighting prowess to attempt to complete his own mission. He fits this role well. It is refreshing to see how quickly Trevor is able to accept this woman as a combatant, especially in a time where even women’s suffrage isn’t widely accepted. Although as soon as anyone in the film sees Diana fight, all of the male characters quickly see her value and respect her abilities.
The settings in the film are excellent, even if little time is spent there, with the grime and muck of the Europe theatre looking straight out of an episode of Band of Brothers. The combat is your typical sanitised comic book fare without too much blood and gore and the technology of the day is used reasonably appropriately for warfare in 1918. Our ragtag band of mercenaries are given a bit of development and a few lines of dialogue each, but ultimately they aren’t really our concern.
If there are any major criticisms, it’s that the film feels somewhat rushed. I would have liked more time in Themiscyra with the Amazonians, more time seeing Diana struggle with her disappointment in humanity, more time in the third act with our big bad and its CGI nonsense, which drew me back to Batman vs Superman rather forcibly, although this film’s ending lands far more successfully. This story could have been told over two films, but as it is, it needs to fit within the DC Expanded Universe plans, so we are left wanting more.
It’s great to see a female superhero finally given such a superb origin film. I’d liken it to Captain America: The fist Avenger, or Iron Man, a straight forward three act piece that gets you invested in the main hero and see their origin. I felt the film shows a great deal of the strength and character of Wonder Woman and adds background to her appearance in Batman vs Superman. She is a breath of fresh air after brooding Batman and Snyder’s grumpy Superman and I left the cinema wishing the film was longer and that we could see more of her character and her development through until the present day. This film truly brings a strong character to the forefront of the playground generation, girls and women of all ages have a more deeply developed female warrior from an island of female warriors that looks a lot like they do. I would go and watch it again and I can now say I’m excited to see Justice League later this year, at least for Gal Gadot’s performance.
