Mark Reviews Movies: DAREDEVIL

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Review by Mark Dujsik

Watching Daredevil, I felt as though I was primarily watching the exposition for the next movie. It seems to have no understanding of or concern for its own story arc. Instead, the script by director Mark Steven Johnson and Brian Helgeland advances from one new story within the story to another without ever developing it enough to establish its significance. There’s a lot going on in the first (and I’m certain not the last) chapter of the tale of the titular superhero, but none of it sticks. Then there’s Daredevil himself, a superhero with neat abilities and a personality that would put Batman in a down mood. In fact, the Batman and Daredevil comparison is pretty relevant. Both are vigilantes (then again, aren’t most superheroes really?). Both are driven by the murder of one or more parental figures. Both rely on gadgets. Batman really didn’t have superhuman abilities, and Daredevil’s abilities benefit from a nice little variation in that they are actually the result of a physical handicap. But still, just about all the other characters in his universe—even the villains—are more interesting than he is.

Matt Murdock (Ben Affleck) is lawyer by day and vigilant superhero Daredevil by night. The twist is he’s also blind. You see, as a child, he lived a single-parent home life in Hell’s Kitchen. His father Jack (David Keith) was a washed out prizefighter who ended up taking rough-up jobs from the local crime syndicate. One day, young Matt witnessed his dad doing his work ended up with a barrel of hazardous material in his face. It left him blind but also enhanced his other senses to an exponential level. Father—feeling guilty for inadvertently causing his son’s disability—and son—determined not to let his disadvantage ruin his life—begin to turn their lives around. Dad takes up boxing again, and son training how to best use his newly heightened senses. It can’t last, of course, and dad is killed for refusing to throw a fight, causing son to grow up with an intense desire to serve justice (if justice is blind and so is he, then—well, you know the rest). So when a criminal is acquitted, Daredevil comes in for retribution.

That’s just the basic setup for the rest of the exposition that’s to follow; after the origin story and setting up of Daredevil’s modus operandi, there’s much more to follow. By the time the movie is done, Daredevil will have fallen in love, reevaluated his role as avenger, been accused of a murder he didn’t commit, made an enemy of his lover, and defeated some pretty shady characters. That might have been fine, although still pretty plot-heavy, on its own, but the script also presents us with the back story for another character named Elektra (Jennifer Garner), who takes up a vendetta against Daredevil after he’s murdered in front of her in Daredevil’s presence. Until that point, though, there’s not much to take interest in from Elektra as a character, no matter how physically capable and alluring Jennifer Garner is in the role nor how appropriate the mythological allusion is. Her story and how it affects Daredevil’s quest for justice is the eventual focus of the movie, but it takes far too long to get to that point. Once we get there, the screenplay becomes a rush job as everything falls into place for resolution before it’s properly established.

And call me old-fashioned, but I think we should actually care about the hero to a certain extent. Daredevil is too bland a character for that. He has the vengeance angle, but that’s nothing new and certainly does not allow for any significant or definite character definition. It’s also difficult to identify with him at first as he unjustly dishes out justice. The way in which his finely tuned senses are realized, with blue tinted visual representation of how he’d "see" things, works to great effect. On a character level, something could have been made of his internal conflict when he begins to ponder whether or not the ends justify the means, but it’s glossed over to continue with the story. Ben Affleck could be a superhero, but there’s no way to tell here. His acting choice is to talk seriously in a raspy voice. Whether that’s all he’s decided to do or all that the script allows is open for discussion. Instead, the bad guys are having all the fun. Michael Clarke Duncan is the embodiment of The Kingpin, the city’s crime czar. His voice and physical presence are completely in tune with the role. Colin Farrell owns and perfectly hams up the role of Bullseye, an Irish psychopath with a wicked sense of aim.

Daredevil certainly looks good. It’s dark and flashy and looks very much like a comic book. The action scenes are viscerally exciting, although surprisingly violent. There’s also a welcome sense of humor (Bullseye’s "I want a bloody costume," a cameo appearance by a self-purported comic book junkie, and Daredevil’s weakness to noise pollution come to mind). However, none of these things makes up for the fact that it’s pretty hollow at its core—even for a comic book.

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