The comic book "Suicide Squad" comes the big screen as a group of supervillains team up to try and save the planet. Will Smith and Margot Robbie are among the stars. Time Warner Cable News film critic Neil Rosen filed the following review.
The highly anticipated, big budget comic book movie "Suicide Squad" is here.
A group of imprisoned supervillains is enlisted by a secret government agency, headed up by Viola Davis, to work together to stop a powerful entity bent on destroying the world.
It's based on a popular DC comic, but the premise, at its root, reminded me of "The Dirty Dozen."
The "Suicide Squad" features Will Smith as Deadshot, a sharpshooter assassin whose main goal is to see his loving daughter again. Margot Robbie is the crazy Harley Quinn and Jared Leto takes a turn as The Joker, but he's only in the film for a few minutes.
Directed by David Ayer, the movie starts off well, as we briefly learn about each evil squad member. But the story degenerates, about a third of the way through, into a convoluted and illogical mess, with too many characters in the mix to care about.
The dialogue is rather dopey, but Robbie, Smith and Leto's performances elevate the film. Smith's character was the only one with any emotional resonance, giving you someone to root for.
The production values are quite good, and so is the fun, pop music score. But there's a lot of action scenes, and that shortchanges the storyline. It could have also used more doses of humor.
If you like multi-character comic book movies, like The Avengers, or if you're a fan of the Suicide Squad comic itself, you'll probably have a good time with this and feel, for what it is, that it's decent ride. For non-fans, it's kind of a mess. Skip it.
Neil Rosen’s Big Apple Rating:
Two Apples