Movie Review: Fantastic Four

Action/Adventure/Sci-Fi

Rated – M

Duration – 100mins

Release – August 2015

Director – Josh Trank

Cast – Miles Teller, Kate Mara, Michael B. Jordan, Jamie Bell, Toby Kebbell, Reg E. Cathey, Tim Blake Nelson


Mr Knight 
Walking into the cinema I came along with a big “unknown” about Fantastic Four. I didn’t care for the previous Jessica Alba/Chris Evans versions so this one was a fresh start.

The movie follows Mile’s Teller’s Reed Richards, a school boy aspiring to master teleportation with the help of his class mate, Billy Elliot’s Jamie Bell as Ben Grimm. Once high school is over with, Reed Richards is discovered for his talents and given a chance to develop his teleportation device to transport organic matter to another unknown dimensions mysterious planet and return.

Teaming up with Kate Mara (seen in House of Cards), Michael B. Jordan and Toby Kebbell as Doctor Victor Von Doom (seen as drugged out Johnny Quid in RocknRolla) they manage the feat to get to this planet.
Unless you’re Riddick, travelling to unknown planets has its hazards, and sure enough some strange power source at this world strikes and changes our characters, giving them extraordinary and unusual powers.

Fantastic Four’s story and direction seemed to confuse itself, not knowing whether it wanted to be a dark Christopher Nolan style Batman, or a childish, kid friendly Transformers. I found the acting and building of the characters to be top notch and engaging, but some aspects of the story felt rushed and the big climactic battle to end the story lasted only a few short minutes.

The typical, “we are weak alone, but strong as a team” message came too easy to the group without any tragedy to get them there, and they got the desired results without a speed hump. The writers should have taken some tips from Joss Whedon’s first Avengers team dynamic, and it would have been a much more fulfilling flick.

I will take my hat off to director Josh Trank for giving me something different to what many (M) rated movies usually deliver. Death’s with blood. Trank actually gave adequate gore for soldiers having their heads pop with the flicks villain rampaging through a secure military site.

Fantastic Four kept me interested with some great acting but the movie goes to and fro from dark and serious to cheesy and lame. A lot of potential but not what it could have been. Still worth a look, but don’t wait to the end credits to see a teaser. There isn’t one. 

Mrs Knight
Fantastic Four shows four action heroes bond over an experiment to teleport to an alternate universe which gives them physical powers and changes their appearance in shocking ways. I really enjoyed the first hour and watching this back story unfold.

Unfortunately I found the second hour to be rushed. We quickly see them harness and train their powers and fight the villain all in an hour. Some of the dialogue was quite lame and I caught myself rolling my eyes in parts. I figure it’s intended for a younger, teenage audience. I’m now interested in going back and watching the 2005 Fantastic Four as I remember really enjoying these films when they were released. This was probably because I was their target demographic, being only 16 years old.

Fantastic Four started strong in my opinion. I liked that it took the time to develop a back story. Showing us who the characters were, how they came together and built their relationship as a team. I enjoyed Miles Teller as an actor and also his character, Reed Richards. He reminded me of a young John Cusack and was far less painful compared to him in the Divergent franchise.

Mr Knight annoyingly pointed out one of the villain’s was chewing gum with his mouth open, so this was all I could see from this point forward. It drove me insane.

Despite this, it was still enjoyable for the most part but it never quite made it to fantastic.