Let me preface this critique by saying that these filmmakers are incredibly talented and they have made quality entertainment. In no way am I saying that I would be a better film director than them. I just think they can do so much better. Now, shall we continue?
These three filmmakers share a lot of the same styles. Their films are usually visually arresting and they all know how to expertly film movement and action within the frame. Every up and coming director can learn a lot from these three. However, they all have flaws that are present in their films and they all have to do with the foundation of any film: Story.
Zack Snyder
I first heard of Zack Snyder when I saw 300 at the age of ten. Leading up to the film, my dad told me about the Battle of Thermopylae and how just three hundred Spartans killed two million Persians. As a ten-year-old, you can probably guess that I was immediately hooked. I wasn’t aware that 300 was based on a Frank Miller graphic novel so I thought everything I saw was historically accurate (yes I actually did). I loved 300 and I still love the film for what it is. You don’t go into a film like that and expect some award-winning story. You want to satiate your bloodlust. Zack Snyder’s use of slow motion and the camera zoom was probably a little too much but hell, I never wanted to look away from the screen. I just wanted to see Leonidas and the Spartans drop bodies.
I was mixed on Watchmen when it came out. I think he did the best he could but turning a twelve-issue comic into a movie would be a very tall task for anyone. And I never saw Sucker Punch and I don’t plan to.
Zack Snyder
I first heard of Zack Snyder when I saw 300 at the age of ten. Leading up to the film, my dad told me about the Battle of Thermopylae and how just three hundred Spartans killed two million Persians. As a ten-year-old, you can probably guess that I was immediately hooked. I wasn’t aware that 300 was based on a Frank Miller graphic novel so I thought everything I saw was historically accurate (yes I actually did). I loved 300 and I still love the film for what it is. You don’t go into a film like that and expect some award-winning story. You want to satiate your bloodlust. Zack Snyder’s use of slow motion and the camera zoom was probably a little too much but hell, I never wanted to look away from the screen. I just wanted to see Leonidas and the Spartans drop bodies.
I was mixed on Watchmen when it came out. I think he did the best he could but turning a twelve-issue comic into a movie would be a very tall task for anyone. And I never saw Sucker Punch and I don’t plan to.
My Zack Snyder problems began when Man of Steel came out in 2013. For the first two-thirds of that movie, I was watching a filmmaker who had matured and was finally coming into his own and I immediately started thinking of what he would do next. Then the final act of the film came and I realized I had jumped to way too many conclusions because the testosterone-filled machismo Zack Snyder reared his ugly head. All the restraint I saw for the nearly 70% of the film was there so Snyder could just ejaculate all over the remaining 30%.
Look, I know there have been endless arguments about why Superman would let Zod destroy half a city (and kill thousands of people) before finally killing him when he has a small family cornered. For a hero that tries to tell people the symbol on his chest stands for hope, he sure isn’t an endorsement of that when he’s throwing his enemy into buildings reducing them to rubble. Throw in the glaring product placement and questionable writing/story choices (Zod repeatedly telling him of his sole purpose that Krypton must live on; Jonathan Kent essentially killing himself in a tornado and Supes not doing anything rather than have Jonathan Kent die of a heart attack like in the comics!!!! - Supes can’t stop a heart attack) and you have a mixed reaction to the film.
Then there’s Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice… The movie that made me lose all faith in Zack Snyder as a director. Batman v. Superman does not feel like a cohesive story. It feels like a bunch of scenes tangentially related to each other and thrown together. I don’t understand how Supes can hear Lois Lane fall from a building while he is across the world but he cannot hear his mother when she is kidnapped. Superman does not have to fight Batman at all. He could literally just fly in the air and tell Batman about Lex’s plan but they fight because the movie is called Batman v. Superman and the plot demands it. Why does Lois Lane throw the Kryptonite trident into the water? Why does Lex Luthor have superhero logos for Wonder Woman, Aquaman, and Flash on his computer? Why does Superman have to stab Doomsday when Wonder Woman could have taken the spear and stabbed Doomsday and everyone could have lived? WHY? WHY? WHY? There are some very good-looking scenes but the film just doesn’t make any sense at all.
Look, I know there have been endless arguments about why Superman would let Zod destroy half a city (and kill thousands of people) before finally killing him when he has a small family cornered. For a hero that tries to tell people the symbol on his chest stands for hope, he sure isn’t an endorsement of that when he’s throwing his enemy into buildings reducing them to rubble. Throw in the glaring product placement and questionable writing/story choices (Zod repeatedly telling him of his sole purpose that Krypton must live on; Jonathan Kent essentially killing himself in a tornado and Supes not doing anything rather than have Jonathan Kent die of a heart attack like in the comics!!!! - Supes can’t stop a heart attack) and you have a mixed reaction to the film.
Then there’s Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice… The movie that made me lose all faith in Zack Snyder as a director. Batman v. Superman does not feel like a cohesive story. It feels like a bunch of scenes tangentially related to each other and thrown together. I don’t understand how Supes can hear Lois Lane fall from a building while he is across the world but he cannot hear his mother when she is kidnapped. Superman does not have to fight Batman at all. He could literally just fly in the air and tell Batman about Lex’s plan but they fight because the movie is called Batman v. Superman and the plot demands it. Why does Lois Lane throw the Kryptonite trident into the water? Why does Lex Luthor have superhero logos for Wonder Woman, Aquaman, and Flash on his computer? Why does Superman have to stab Doomsday when Wonder Woman could have taken the spear and stabbed Doomsday and everyone could have lived? WHY? WHY? WHY? There are some very good-looking scenes but the film just doesn’t make any sense at all.
When Snyder was asked about the negative reviews of the film, he said, “I’m a comic book guy and i made the movie based as much as I could on that aesthetic. And so I don’t know how else to do it 100%, so it is what it is.”
Dude, it’s not about the f***ing aesthetic when you are crafting a film! It’s about telling a compelling story. If people are not into the story, they aren’t going to buy tickets for repeat viewing and they aren’t going to tell their friends to go see it. That’s why a film with the two most popular comic heroes ever and the most popular female superhero did not crack $900 million, let alone $1 billion. Moving on…
Dude, it’s not about the f***ing aesthetic when you are crafting a film! It’s about telling a compelling story. If people are not into the story, they aren’t going to buy tickets for repeat viewing and they aren’t going to tell their friends to go see it. That’s why a film with the two most popular comic heroes ever and the most popular female superhero did not crack $900 million, let alone $1 billion. Moving on…
Guy Ritchie
Other than Guy Ritchie’s awkward interview with David Spade a couple years ago, I kind of like the director. He provides mindless entertainment chock full of funny and almost unintelligible British accents as well as some impressively shot action scenes. But again, his movies are rather forgettable.
The first Guy Ritchie film I ever saw was 2009’s Sherlock Holmes and I absolutely loved the film. I must have watched it almost twenty times during the summer between my seventh and eighth grade years.The music choices (still trying to memorize “The Rocky Road to Dublin”), thrilling action, and exceptional performances of Robert Downey Jr., Jude Law, Rachel McAdams, and Mark Strong all added up to a wildly entertaining adventure that truly left audiences wanting more. And for better or worse, they got it.
Released in 2011, Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows gave us more of the same - nothing more, nothing less. It was cinema’s version of the video game Crackdown 2. Stephen Fry was a pleasant surprise and Jared Harris was a somewhat compelling villain but the aesthetic and snappy humor was not fresh. I just felt like I had seen it before because… well I had, just two years earlier.
However, I had high hopes for 2015’s The Man from U.N.C.L.E. after seeing the first trailer earlier in the year. Dope suits, period-piece espionage, and Nina Simone’s “Feeling Good” bumping in the trailer? Take my money and sign me up. I figured it would be a somewhat toned-down Guy Ritchie movie because it was a spy film. I found out how wrong I was when the four minute Comic-Con trailer dropped and basically showed the largest action set piece of the film.
Then August came around and I got the stereotypical Guy Ritchie film, just no outrageous British accents. Instead, we got some pretty bad American accents by British actors. Funny wordplay and gunplay throughout the film, but no real character development and a lackluster villain as well as an ending scene setting up a sequel that would never come. All in all, just another hollow action movie.
Other than Guy Ritchie’s awkward interview with David Spade a couple years ago, I kind of like the director. He provides mindless entertainment chock full of funny and almost unintelligible British accents as well as some impressively shot action scenes. But again, his movies are rather forgettable.
The first Guy Ritchie film I ever saw was 2009’s Sherlock Holmes and I absolutely loved the film. I must have watched it almost twenty times during the summer between my seventh and eighth grade years.The music choices (still trying to memorize “The Rocky Road to Dublin”), thrilling action, and exceptional performances of Robert Downey Jr., Jude Law, Rachel McAdams, and Mark Strong all added up to a wildly entertaining adventure that truly left audiences wanting more. And for better or worse, they got it.
Released in 2011, Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows gave us more of the same - nothing more, nothing less. It was cinema’s version of the video game Crackdown 2. Stephen Fry was a pleasant surprise and Jared Harris was a somewhat compelling villain but the aesthetic and snappy humor was not fresh. I just felt like I had seen it before because… well I had, just two years earlier.
However, I had high hopes for 2015’s The Man from U.N.C.L.E. after seeing the first trailer earlier in the year. Dope suits, period-piece espionage, and Nina Simone’s “Feeling Good” bumping in the trailer? Take my money and sign me up. I figured it would be a somewhat toned-down Guy Ritchie movie because it was a spy film. I found out how wrong I was when the four minute Comic-Con trailer dropped and basically showed the largest action set piece of the film.
Then August came around and I got the stereotypical Guy Ritchie film, just no outrageous British accents. Instead, we got some pretty bad American accents by British actors. Funny wordplay and gunplay throughout the film, but no real character development and a lackluster villain as well as an ending scene setting up a sequel that would never come. All in all, just another hollow action movie.
King Arthur: Legend of the Sword made me angry. Not because Guy Ritchie directed it, but because Warner Bros. gave him $175 million to make a King Arthur movie immediately after his previous movie lost money for the studio. How does a film studio consciously make that decision? First of all, a King Arthur movie doesn’t need $175 million. Period. You are not making the next Avatar film. Also, if you are going to do King Arthur, then commit all the way. Don’t do the snarky modern British snappy dialogue for a story that is set in late fifth-century England. Film studios will only put a lot of money toward something with existing IP, but even I could have told them that the King Arthur intellectual property was not going to make them $700 million. They could have invested in brand new IP for up and coming filmmakers but instead, they lost $150 million due to the film’s failure.
Guy Ritchie’s next film is the live-action Aladdin film and based on the most recent trailer with the blue Will Smith as Genie, let’s just pray on that one.
Guy Ritchie’s next film is the live-action Aladdin film and based on the most recent trailer with the blue Will Smith as Genie, let’s just pray on that one.
Baz Luhrmann
Finally, we come to Baz Luhrmann. Now, what Zack Snyder and Guy Ritchie do for action movies, Baz Luhrmann does for romance. His films are absolutely beautiful to look at, but once you get past that, there isn’t much there. Moulin Rouge! is a fun movie with catchy songs and at least one that really resonates with you (“Come What May”), but it just runs out of steam. Baz Luhrmann’s The Great Gatsby was rather disappointing and another example of an unnecessarily high budget (reportedly $105-$190 million).
I saw The Great Gatsby toward the end of my sophomore year in high school. We read the book that year since we covered American Literature in English so it was a nice culmination at the end of the year to see the movie. You can tell that Luhrmann is in love with the idea of the Roaring Twenties in America as long as he can put his own spin on it. For example, Luhrmann puts a Jay-Z song in the middle of the film as women are dancing in slow motion while standing in a convertible driving across a bridge. Yes it looks great and is visually stunning, but it just doesn’t fit. You could draw from some of the greatest American composers of the Jazz Age with people like Duke Ellington, Count Basie, or Louis Armstrong and Luhrmann chooses Jay-Z. As you would expect with a cast that includes Leonardo Dicaprio, Joel Edgerton, and Carrie Mulligan, the performances are great, if maybe a little over the top. The movie is nice to look at even if you may wonder, “Why is there so much CGI and green screen in a film that takes place during the roaring twenties?”.
Adapting The Great Gatsby is tough since so much of the novel is based in Nick Carraway’s (Tobey Maguire) head and it’s all about how he views things so the narration is provided in the movie, but it feels lifeless and way too on the nose like he is just repeating what the audience is already thinking.
With the exceptions of Batman v. Superman and King Arthur: Legend of the Sword, I don’t think any of the films mentioned above are bad movies. Nor are the men who made them bad directors. Nevertheless, they can be so much better if the directors focused as much on the screenplay and the story as they did on the visuals and the action. The story is the backbone of any film and everything else should take a backseat.
Finally, we come to Baz Luhrmann. Now, what Zack Snyder and Guy Ritchie do for action movies, Baz Luhrmann does for romance. His films are absolutely beautiful to look at, but once you get past that, there isn’t much there. Moulin Rouge! is a fun movie with catchy songs and at least one that really resonates with you (“Come What May”), but it just runs out of steam. Baz Luhrmann’s The Great Gatsby was rather disappointing and another example of an unnecessarily high budget (reportedly $105-$190 million).
I saw The Great Gatsby toward the end of my sophomore year in high school. We read the book that year since we covered American Literature in English so it was a nice culmination at the end of the year to see the movie. You can tell that Luhrmann is in love with the idea of the Roaring Twenties in America as long as he can put his own spin on it. For example, Luhrmann puts a Jay-Z song in the middle of the film as women are dancing in slow motion while standing in a convertible driving across a bridge. Yes it looks great and is visually stunning, but it just doesn’t fit. You could draw from some of the greatest American composers of the Jazz Age with people like Duke Ellington, Count Basie, or Louis Armstrong and Luhrmann chooses Jay-Z. As you would expect with a cast that includes Leonardo Dicaprio, Joel Edgerton, and Carrie Mulligan, the performances are great, if maybe a little over the top. The movie is nice to look at even if you may wonder, “Why is there so much CGI and green screen in a film that takes place during the roaring twenties?”.
Adapting The Great Gatsby is tough since so much of the novel is based in Nick Carraway’s (Tobey Maguire) head and it’s all about how he views things so the narration is provided in the movie, but it feels lifeless and way too on the nose like he is just repeating what the audience is already thinking.
With the exceptions of Batman v. Superman and King Arthur: Legend of the Sword, I don’t think any of the films mentioned above are bad movies. Nor are the men who made them bad directors. Nevertheless, they can be so much better if the directors focused as much on the screenplay and the story as they did on the visuals and the action. The story is the backbone of any film and everything else should take a backseat.