Shazam! (2019)

Title: Shazam!

Year: 2019

Genre: Action | Adventure | Comedy |

Runtime:  132min

Director: David F. Sandberg

Starring: Zachary Levi, Michelle Borth, Djimon Hounsou

8,3/10                  

We all have a superhero inside us, it just takes a bit of magic to bring it out. In Billy Batson’s case, by shouting out one word – SHAZAM! – this streetwise fourteen-year-old foster kid can turn into the adult superhero Shazam.

COMEDY-ORIENTED SUPERHERO MOVIE DRIVES DC IN RIGHT DIRECTION?

With movies that don’t take itself way to serious, it might be easy for the audience to distance themselves from the movie.  Comedies tend to do just that. Parodies themselves for the worse. Create an illusion of the imaginary world and with Shazam!, it’s clear that DC and Warner Bros. takes their characters in a different direction. It’s good to see a movie that pushes the DC brand in a worthy direction, that might be fulfilling for the company itself and the audience.

Just like Marvel’s Spider-Man, there’s a high-school setting, teenagers and bad parenting involved in the plot. Plus one of these has superpowers. Please notice that this movie took mostly the inspiration of Big (1988) starring Tom Hanks. That is also why there is a piece of music playing piano in of the chasing scenes. It’s filled with a grave simplicity, that adapts the plotline to modern society with wide access to social. It’s integrated to the storyline where the boys- Billy and Freddy upload Videos from their own little experiments. 

The characterization of everyone feels somewhat weak and pale to some extent. There’s no depth, what so ever, for Billy except he has lost his mother, which seen to be a common problem in this sort of movies and stories.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s way more fun than Wonder Woman and  Justice League, that drowned in problems and plot holes. This is a fun engaging movie but the visual effects for the villain, played by Mark Strong, who gives an absent performance: ain’t the best work of art. The monsters make the whole concept looks cheap and poorly done. The way it’s written and directed as it’s based on a comic-book; the comedy and the action feel worthy to the film’s purpose. Although, the third act doesn’t feel that appealing, as I wish it should. The pace wrapped up rashly and rushed.

The director seems to know what’s going on here. I wish there was a less comical touch on the more serious scenes but, I guess… This is just what we get. It could have been better, but as it focus a fairly amount of just comedy-oriented direction, there is not much more to expect. It was better and way more entertaining than I thought it would be. But the third act made me a little disappointed, as the beginning gives some big hopes. As it turns out; all of the siblings in Billys family has also superpowers as it’s described in the beginning. That’s the way they defeat Mark Strong pale villain.