Yesterday, I mooched into town to the Moray Playhouse again. Aquaman was selling out since they'd moved it into Cinema 3 for Mary Poppins. I decided to buy a ticket although the smallest cinema only seats about twenty people; it's more suited to private screenings ( such as our book group's hire for My Cousin Rachel last year).
Reviews have been fairly positive and although it's overlong - by about half an hour- I was entertained by it.
However, the tone is all over the place, veering from frat-boy humour to high fantasy and the plot is wearyingly familiar. Jason Momoa's Aquaman is a tattooed brawler with no time for personal hygiene: Conan the Atlantean, obviously. Early in the film, he saves a Russian submarine crew from Black Manta while in the sunken city, half-brother Orm has imperial ambitions to become the Ocean Master.
The surly sea king-to-be is assisted by Amber Heard's Mera, who leads him on a quest for a magic trident. This journey, already tired from the bloated Hobbit movies, encompasses the Sahara to a Pellucidar-like world at the Earth's core (Skartaris?). It culminates in a reunion with Arthur's mother, Atlanna (Nicole Kidman) in a sequence that strongly reminded me of similar events in Ant-Man and the Wasp. The eye-blasting Manta attacks the aqueous pair in a pretty interlude in Sicily and the aggressive sibling's armada is defeated in a welter of mermen and crab-soldiers.
The visual storytelling is certainly spectacular with its fabulous marine super-civilization, water-based technology and exotic beaches around the globe. But the film felt crammed with diversions: an encounter with the carnivorous Trench from the New 52 could have stood alone as a film in its own right. I could barely hear much of Momoa's grunted dialogue and was more interested in Heard's character; Geoff Johns finally convinced me of Mera's worth, beyond Dejah Thoris-style kidnappings. It's a success for DC but I felt we'd seen all this before in the first two Thor films and Black Panther.
A small audience is inhibited so obvious spaces for laughs rang hollow. Personally, I am so sick of moments where superheroes go " Oh, shit" just like you and me. No doubt the sequel will feature that risible harpoon-hook-hand from the Nineties.
I know it won't matter to the cinema-going public but the metamorphosis of Aquaman from the blond hero of Fradon, Cardy and Aparo into Jae Lee's hair-metal Namor irks me most.
Aquaman isn't a character I followed very faithfully but here are some of the comics I think of when the Sea King comes to mind:
Hope Santa is good to you,
Coming soon: Doctor Who's Ne'er Day Special
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