Years ago, the superhero Samaritan fought his nemesis… uh… Nemesis in a battle to the death. Now, a young boy named Sam (Javon “Wanna” Walton) becomes convinced that his next-door neighbor (Sylvester Stallone) is the mythic crimefighter. Meanwhile, a crime lord (Pilou Asbaek) gets his hands on Nemesis’ hammer, the only thing that can kill Samaritan, and begins amassing fanatic followers to take over the city.
It's bad enough we have all these comic book movies based on actual comic books. It’s even worse when Hollywood starts making up their own superheroes (which means they don’t have to pay any royalties). Even though I pretty much knew what to expect from this (especially since it went straight to Prime), I still tried to remain hopeful because of the participation of Sylvester Stallone.
Fortunately, Samaritan was just a little bit better than I anticipated. That’s mostly due to Stallone’s performance, which is easily the best thing about the movie. His character may be cliched as all get out (Old Man With a Secret Who Just Wants to Be LEFT ALONE), but he finds ways to bring a hint of humanity to the film.
Things get off to a janky start. The superhero origin, done in a cartoonish style, is really cheesy, and the mythology behind the characters is pretty thin. (They are brothers who don’t like each other.) Luckily, the film gets better as it goes along, even though it takes a while to find its footing. The scenes where Sly teaches the kid to fight have a Rocky Lite vibe to them, and the big twist is moderately effective.
The biggest problem with Samaritan is that it’s just too low key for its own good. That’s probably due to budgetary constraints more than any attempt to ground the characters in “the real world”. Once the film (and the main character) finally embraces what it really is, it actually becomes a lot of fun. The action in the finale is surprisingly strong, and some of the violence pushes the realms of its PG-13 rating. (It also makes terrific use of its One-F-Bomb-Per-PG-13-Rating.) If it had less moping and more rope-a-doping, it might’ve been a contender.
AKA: Nemesis.
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