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Marvel's Black Widow

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  • For anyone interested, Harbour just did an interview on the "Hot Ones" You Tube Channel.



  • Registered Users Posts: 7,515 ✭✭✭Outkast_IRE


    It's middle of the road , not the best , far from the worst. Enjoyable but not much more. Not a bad way to spend a few hours.



  • Registered Users Posts: 15,416 ✭✭✭✭AMKC
    Ms


    I want and seen this on Tuesday and enjoyed it. There is some good laughs in it and some good action scenes but the bit in the middle is very dragged out. There is some good backstory to Natasha too but not all of it Is there.

    I wonder will they do another Black Widow film to fill in some of that?

    Live long and Prosper

    Peace and long life.



  • Registered Users Posts: 1,298 ✭✭✭santana75


    I'd agree with that. Its bad, and I dont say that lightly. Waiting for the extra scene after the credits its unreal to see how many people worked on this movie. And I have no doubt they worked very hard and very long hours. Which makes it more painful that the finished product is so poor. Its the story thats the problem.......there is no story and without an engaging plot, it doesnt matter about anything else really. Saw the fast and the furious 9 a couple weeks back and Black widow makes that movie look like The Godfather.



  • Registered Users Posts: 11,739 ✭✭✭✭expectationlost


    what was the point of the prison escape scene?



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  • Registered Users Posts: 1,298 ✭✭✭santana75


    I think you're seeing completely different reviews than the ones I read because the critics were falling over themselves trying not to say anything that could in any way be perceived as not bigging up the female leads.



  • Registered Users Posts: 2,090 ✭✭✭notahappycamper


    Agree with this. Hoping it would be great but no, it is poor. Some scenes I felt there was an awkwardness between the actors. I dunno, there has been sooooo many MCU films at this stage, is it time to just stop?



  • Registered Users Posts: 2,090 ✭✭✭notahappycamper




  • Registered Users Posts: 2,090 ✭✭✭notahappycamper




  • Registered Users Posts: 2,090 ✭✭✭notahappycamper




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  • Registered Users Posts: 3,809 ✭✭✭joe40


    I thought the movie was fine. Fairly typical marvel fare at this stage. I like the them, especially as family movies. I'm certainly not a fan but you can always be sure of reasonably good movie with MCU. I know they're formulaic but there is still a market for movies like that.



  • Moderators, Category Moderators, Entertainment Moderators Posts: 35,718 CMod ✭✭✭✭pixelburp


    If you think it's time for the MCU to stop, regardless of one's position - it only reveals being shielded from reality. Obviously the poster hadn't heard of Phase 4 😁



  • Registered Users Posts: 15,416 ✭✭✭✭AMKC
    Ms


    Just a tip for anyone who has not yet seen Black Widow or has decided to go see it a second time. There is a post credits scene. I only heard about myself of the brother who just told me. Raging as when the film credits started to roll at the cinema I was in they turned on the lights straight away so I assumed there was none.

    Live long and Prosper

    Peace and long life.



  • Moderators, Recreation & Hobbies Moderators Posts: 20,650 Mod ✭✭✭✭Brian?


    I wish this was an option. I've 2 boys, 10 and 8, I'm going to have to sit through the absolute pony that is the MCU for a while yet.

    I read this thread because I'm a massive Scarlett Johansson fan. She's a wonderful actress, when given something to work with. She is wasted in the MCU. I was hoping they may have changed this with her own film. Pity they didn't get Taiki Wahtiti to direct it, Jojo Rabbit was amazing and Thor Ragnorak is actually a good film.

    they/them/theirs


    And so on, and so on …. - Slavoj Žižek




  • Moderators, Category Moderators, Entertainment Moderators Posts: 35,718 CMod ✭✭✭✭pixelburp


    I thought this showed both the strengths and weaknesses of the MCU as a whole myself, so it won't challenge anyone's confirmation bias; but as I feared, it had an inescapable sense of redundancy throughout, given it was the franchise's first proper prequel.

    To the good: the direction during the quieter character moments was strong, while even the action itself was decent for once, with a PG13 crunchiness in its first fights. The set-pieces more likely helmed by Cate Shortland herself were well staged; in fact, it served as reminder that the Russo's might be masters of logistics, but they're dreadful directors of chaos. Shortland showed a much better head for geography and impact, the camera never truly losing its mind through cuts and hyperactivity.

    To the bad though: even after all that excellent, low stakes thrill of the MI or Bourne lineage, the finale of CGI destruction hit like whiplash, the biggest hat-tip of executive privilege stressed into the script. And foreshadowing with a clip from Moonraker ultimately felt like I was a little lamp-shaded when the location was revealed. I know the automatic response - that's the brand, what do you expect! - and that's fair to a point, but when the rest of the film did solid work to distance itself from the tropes, to drop the ball at the end disappointed. Some of the quippy patter was crudely inserted in places and undermined the tone of the aforementioned character moments. Again, that's the brand but it has been done better.

    On the whole though, I enjoyed it way more than I expected - but respect too why it might have frustrated others.

    Ray Winstone's accent though. Ye gods. Why hire the most English of actors to then have him play Russian??



  • Registered Users Posts: 12,775 ✭✭✭✭Gbear


    The last act truly was garbage.

    It's not that the fight scenes before were totally reasonable, but they were reasonable enough. They also tried to do this see-sawing Ocean's 11-style reverse plot reveal thing, and invented a plot device and then resolved it within 30 seconds with Ray Winstone's magic smell.

    That stuff only works when you work it into the plot earlier so you can actually register its effect, and don't know how it's going to be resolved. Then you can be surprised when you're shown the flashback outlining the plan, and get to experience momentary dramatic irony before it jumps back to the present and the plot point is resolved. It's like they wrote themselves into a corner, and realised they had an explosion quota to meet, and another 15 minutes of film to fill up.

    I really really hated the line about the only unlimited resource being young girls. That's not a thing that makes any sense to say. He may as well have twirled his moustache and said "I sure do like killing puppies".

    "Watch this giant corporate behemoth punch misogyny in the face, literally! Girl Power!" Also, watch these long shots following Scarlett Johansson's arse.

    I also don't see the point in getting a bunch of English and American actors to put on Eastern European/Russian accents. The only one who's actually from that neck of the woods in the film didn't even get any lines. This surely didn't need to be a vehicle for David Harbor. At least with the Winter Soldier, they got a guy who can actually speak about 12 languages and is from Eastern Europe.

    In its own right, it was passable. As an element of the ongoing story of the MCU, it was largely pointless. It would've been slightly better if it had been released after Civil War, but it quite possibly would've been a different film then.



  • Moderators, Category Moderators, Entertainment Moderators Posts: 35,718 CMod ✭✭✭✭pixelburp


    I've seen it said now a few times in recent years that "pre-vis" is what's killing these sorts of blockbusters from an authorial point of view; that before the nominal director has stepped onboard, various set-pieces have been workshopped, pre-visualised and locked in - so at best the 2nd Unit director might have some work but the FX heavy stuff requires little from the director. I'd be genuinely surprised if Shortland had any hand in that last act, beyond those brief interstitials between CGI ScarJos leaping about. What made the difference here was that in the downtime you could clearly see the director's talents at work, making the dissonance between the Quiet & Loud more overt than other directors in the MCU stable.

    As to Ray Winstone: the annoying thing is he is a good actor, he's just not the man you call when you vant a Rrrushan acksunt cor blimey. Funny how in 2021 so much is frowned on yet funny accents are still OK. But like you said the actual character itself was so badly constructed, that's the real offence. Nothing to say beyond "evil man hates women, please boo". Which, ya know. Fine. Trafficking is a scourge, and something that needs more light shone on it - but I don't think Black Widow is the medium to challenge it either. Mad Max: Fury Road was no less subtle in a women-as-things narrative, but handled it with more brio and intelligence. If the script had the nerve to have a last-minute twist that shock ...

    Taskmaster wasn't under the influence of the dust & just really hated Natasha 'cos she blew her up, ruining her life ...

    I think that might have been a more interesting take on the story; especially given Black Widow was supposedly coming to terms with her past. I suppose blowing up a kid was bad enough, but the last act felt like a Get Out Of Jail Card at the same time. Maybe.

    The Red Letter Media review joked about how Winstone's character kinda, sorta looked like Martin Scorcese, wondering if this was a wink towards his comments against the Marvel movies. Probably not, but still...



  • Registered Users Posts: 12,775 ✭✭✭✭Gbear


    Even if you look at Thor: Ragnarok - what I think is genuinely good on the merits as a comedy adventure film, and not just enjoyable mush you stuff into your eyes, the weakest parts are, by a distance, the fight scenes, other than the one between Thor and the Hulk, which is probably down to the non-fighty stuff in that scene - the cutaways to Tom Hiddleston, and the one-way conversation Thor is having with the Hulk.

    I don't know whether they did the same system of divided labour between the "filmy" stuff being done by the director, and the "explodey" stuff done by some egg-heads, but at any rate, the quality of the film was in how it played to the strengths of the cast and the director.

    I don't know if that's always been a problem, and I don't think it was the case for the Russo Brothers films - whatever you think about them, I don't think there's the same sense of detachment from the action in those films.

    It seemed like they didn't want to have a situation where Romanoff could be anything other than perfectly heroic. Yes she blew her up, but she saved her in the end, so all's well that ends well, right?

    The alternative, giving Taskmaster agency, and her having chosen to work for her father, would've robbed Romanoff of the chance to make amends. All she could do then would be to kill her, preventing any more harm, which is maybe too morally ambiguous for a Marvel film. I was actually surprised they even had her kill a child (even if it turned out not to have stuck).

    With the sort of rotund, scraggly greying beard thing going on, I assumed it was more a Weinstein jab.

    I don't think the way you have a jab at people who make snobbish criticisms about your films is to portray them as human traffickers.



  • Registered Users Posts: 13,990 ✭✭✭✭StringerBell


    Found it fairly boring tbh, overlong and the final part of the film was ridiculously bad. Started alright and I do enjoy Scarlett Johansson but there was very little for her to do here. The sister was the one with the push I assume they will have her in films at some point replacing Scarlett?

    Having adolescent kids isn't all its cracked up to be folks, been some very enjoyable MCU films don't get me wrong, this just wasn't one of them.

    "People say ‘go with the flow’ but do you know what goes with the flow? Dead fish."



  • Registered Users Posts: 17,822 ✭✭✭✭silverharp


    not a horrible film just boring and a bit meh, interesting start to see where it might be going, just fell apart after that , no real momentum in the film. Kids would be bored with this too with the lack of pace. And let me get this straight, the Widows are female because there are too many girls? what kind of weird ass writing is that?

    Looks like it might struggle to turn a profit, it had a huge 2nd week drop off.

    A belief in gender identity involves a level of faith as there is nothing tangible to prove its existence which, as something divorced from the physical body, is similar to the idea of a soul. - Colette Colfer



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  • Registered Users Posts: 74 ✭✭Lujan


    I found it pretty poor.

    Weak enough story, plenty of pointless filler, poor fights.

    Wasn't expecting much from the movie, but was still disappointed.

    Shame because I have enjoyed all of the other MCU movies



  • Moderators, Category Moderators, Entertainment Moderators Posts: 35,718 CMod ✭✭✭✭pixelburp


    It's funny how often the villain seemingly fails to register in the scriptwriter's priorities - or Feige I suppose - if we're talking about where the creative buck stops. I guess they're simply a means to an end with the series, a figurative or literal obstruction for the hero's goals as part of the big FX set-piece in the 3rd act. The obvious, big exception being Thanos - and the few times a film gets to craft a decent villain (ala Killmonger in Black Panther). And when they ARE half-decent, they're invariably killed off.

    I wonder if Feige or somebody has ever commented or talked candidly on the subject; lord knows the superhero genre is kinda known for its structure of Hero vs. Villain, and for all the things the MCU does right it's a consistent wrinkle for me.



  • Registered Users Posts: 17,180 ✭✭✭✭fritzelly


    Was an ok film - not much to choose from at the mo in terms of entertainment so maybe I'm ranking it higher than it deserves

    Not something I would bother giving a second watch

    The family dynamic scenes were a bit ridiculous - trying to be funny but were just stupid



  • Registered Users Posts: 2,368 ✭✭✭kerplun k


    The Good: Cate Shortland, Florence Pugh and Scarlett Johansson. Out with the old and in with the Pugh.


    The Bad: The villains.


    The Ugly: CGI and that awful sky fight. I didn’t think they could top the Black Panther one, but hey, there you go.



  • Registered Users Posts: 17,822 ✭✭✭✭silverharp


    A belief in gender identity involves a level of faith as there is nothing tangible to prove its existence which, as something divorced from the physical body, is similar to the idea of a soul. - Colette Colfer



  • Moderators, Category Moderators, Entertainment Moderators Posts: 35,718 CMod ✭✭✭✭pixelburp


    The ugly CGI was especially annoying given how many times this movie got its release bumped back; there was plenty of time to fine tune the FX once the original release date was CoVid'ed. They must have had it "complete" before the first release date, and a standard rush job at that.



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