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Hancock – Movie Review | DavidGHeiser.com
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Hancock – Movie Review

By David Heiser ⋅ December 8, 2008 ⋅ Email This Post Email This Post ⋅ Print This Post Print This Post ⋅ Post a comment

MetaCritic Score: 49

You’ve got to give them credit for trying. Besides the new incarnation of the Batman franchise, the past decade’s burst of superhero movies haven’t held a single interesting character. Hancock is, at least, a departure from your run of the mill Marvel Comics hero.

Played by Will Smith, the walking box office guarantee himself, Hancock is a heavy drinking, socially challenged, bulletproof immortal. He stops criminals and saves lives, but usually does so while he’s three sheets to the wind, leaving millions of dollars in property damage in his wake. Despite his gifts, the city sees him as a nuisance and generally wishes he would go away.

During one of his ham-handed rescues, Hancock saves Ray, a well-intentioned but seemingly unsuccessful PR man, from an oncoming train. Ray (Jason Bateman), in turn, offers his image consulting services to Hancock as a means of repayment. Ray’s wife, Mary (Charlize Theron), doesn’t like the idea. She doesn’t think that Hancock can be trusted and just doesn’t want him around her family. Going against his wife’s wishes, Ray procedes. Though Hancock is initially hesitant, he eventually begins to comply with Ray’s plan. Hancock’s patience is tested when he is asked to go to prison for the damage he has caused, which we are informed he has been asked to do numerous times before. Though they can’t really force him to do anything, Ray thinks that allowing the public to see what life would be like without Hancock patrolling the streets for a few weeks would do wonders for his image. While he is in prison, things start to go a little haywire in the city. Inevitably, Hancock’s services are needed again, but with what results?

This movie frustrated me. I didn’t hate it, but it could have been so much more. Hancock is such a unique character–a seriously flawed superhero–that if they would have gone just a little darker, I think this story could have been great. Instead, as the story progresses the plot twists become more and more predictable. The blend of comedy, action, and drama didn’t connect well with me, and I found myself not really caring during the film’s most emotional moments. The lack of emotional resonance could have also been related to the cast. While Smith does well with what he is given, Theron’s performance is really flat and Bateman’s character is just so weak that he comes off as pathetic.

Overall, Hancock had the potential to be something special, but ended up being a standard Hollywood blockbuster. The film isn’t going to particularly challenge or impress you, but I guess there are worse ways to spend an hour and a half.

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Discussion

4 comments for “Hancock – Movie Review”

  1. You’re a sociology major? One would think that you would have picked up the blatantly racist narrative that ran rampant throughout the film. Have a white man teach him how to use his “power”? Literally condemn the nature of his strength until it fits into the socially normative (ie, Bateman’s white, dominant) structure?

    Hell, even without getting all Foucaultian it’s offensive. Perpetuates all those racial stereotypes we thought were gone until Barack Obama ran for president and they came out in full force.

    Posted by Anonymous | December 9, 2008, 12:26 am

  2. You know, I thought about that, but I think that it was more carelessness than intent. Will Smith is a VERY smart and VERY rich guy, do you really think he would have taken this part if it was really blatantly racist?

    Beyond what you said about Bateman, I think the real tragedy of this movie was that it was the first hugely popular superhero movie with a black main character, and that character is a destructive, alcoholic asshole.

    Posted by David Heiser | December 9, 2008, 12:40 pm

  3. David, you make me laugh. This is Hollywood. They don’t do racism, in case you didn’t know by the overflowing liberal bullshit that comes out of it. Maybe he had to change his behavior in the movie to conform with social norms, not “white” norms. And there have been black superheroes…Blade, Storm in X-men. The reason there hasn’t been other black super heroes is because they come from comic books, where the heroes have been white. You can’t just change the color (like someone wants to do with a remake of the Karate Kid). Hollywood sells movies, they wouldn’t jeaporadize that to plant hidden racism into a movie. Maybe Indy films would but not something put out by powerhouse studios.

    Posted by Anonymous | December 10, 2008, 9:44 pm

  4. Hey, I wasn’t the one who said it was blatantly racist, that was the first commenter.

    I wasn’t complaining about the lack of black superheroes either (for the record, I don’t think I’d consider Blade a superhero, and Storm was part of the X-Men, but not the real center of the movie like a Spiderman or Hulk). I just said that it’s a shame that, with the lack of black superheroes in movies, that this is the type of character they chose to fill that hole.

    Also, racism doesn’t have to be intentional to be present. I think the first commenter may have been reading into things a little more deeply than were intentioned, in this case, but that doesn’t mean that it never shows up.

    Posted by David Heiser | December 10, 2008, 9:53 pm

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