One of this year's hottest summer flicks is heading to DVD in October, the super-hero sequel FANTASTIC FOUR: RISE OF THE SILVER SURFER. The film picks up a short while after the first movie, and now the FF are the hot celebs in town. We join proceedings just days before the nuptuals of Mr. Fantastic and Susan Storm, aka the Invisible Woman. But there is trouble afoot, this time nor from Dr. Doom, though Julian McMahon's character does eventually feature in the sequel, but from an unseen force, the Silver Surfer, a stranger that wants to bring Earth to its knees - well blow it up to be more precise.
Now, I kinda enjoyed the first FANTASTIC FOUR, but overall thought that it lacked that certain something, something that other, similar flicks like SPIDER-MAN, SUPERMAN RETURNS or BATMAN BEGINS had in spades. Depth. The same applies here I'm afraid, and while this isn't a bad movie, it certainly won't appeal to the comic book die hard massive. In fact, like the first movie 'Silver Surfer' is aimed more at the younger audience, which is blindly obvious from the outset. The comedy is slapstick, and in some scenes it reminded me of a Chuckle Brothers TV show (British kids show aimed at the under 8's - ish), the performances are two-dimentional, and the CGI effects in places look unfinished, although they seem to get a little better as the film rolls on.
But strangely, I didn't outright hate it. The pluses. The film's plot takes us all over the globe and in one of the more entertaining moments, the Fantastics have to save one of London's most famous landmarks, the London Eye. Julian McMahon is superb as the true villain of the piece, Victor Von Doom, though is terribly underused, and I must say that I much prefer to see the Australian actor smashing the granny out of a size ten model in NIP/ TUCK. Personal preference. There are also a few comedic moments that brought a smile to my face, mostly from the direction of Michael Chicklis' Thing. And there is the fact that Jessica Alba gets naked in one of the 'power swapping' scenes. Which brings us on to the negatives. Being a PG rated movie, we get to see bugger all, and what is going on with Alba's horrible blonde locks? The film, for me also didn't have enough time developing characters, in particular the newcomer, the Silver Surfer, here played by PAN'S LABYRINTH's Doug Jones body-wise, and Laurence Fishburne vocal-wise. The Surfer is one of my favourite characters from the comic books and 80's TV show, and the lack of depth or time made available to flesh out his character so to speak disappoints - which sums up the movie really. Was Tim Story the right man for the job?
In all this isn't terrible, but in the days of the superb SPIDER-MAN and BATMAN franchises, we all expect so much more. Definitely not fantastic.
THE SPECIALS:
Extended / Deleted Scenes (with optional commentary by director Tim Story): - Story takes us through some extended and deleted scenes from the movie, which I found more useful with the commentart switched on. Interesting to see what they cut to keep the running time down on this very tight movie.
Family Bonds: The Making of Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer documentary
A standard making of, though it does last a whopping 45-ish minutes and covers all of the pre-production and production aspects of the making of the flick. It all comes across as a little rushed, and the doc outlines a lot of the problems the filmmakers encountered during production.
The FantastiCar: State of the Art featurette: The car right? Chicks dig the car. Obviousley about the creation of the FantastiCar used in the flick.
The Power Cosmic special effects featurette: A look at how the filmmakers/ animators brought the Silver Surfer to life, from concept to screen, though no mention of Laurence Fishburne, who provides the voice for the character.
Character Design With Spectral Motion featurette: Long-winded title that boils down to be the design into Michael Chicklis' new Thing suit, which was apparently more comfortable to wear this time around.
Scoring the Fantastic featurette: About the score, by John Ottman surprisingly.
Interactive FantastiCar concept images gallery: Image gallery of concept drawings for the heavily used FantastiCar.
Also: Theatrical Trailers
Still Galleries (Behind the Scenes / Characters / Concept Art)
THE ROUND-UP
In all, kids will probably dig the cheesy dialogue and frantic action, but for us more mature adults (yeah right), it just don't cut the mustard. Better than the first, but the franchise has a long way to go to catch up with the speeding bullet of Bryan Singer' SUPERMAN RETURNS and even further to better Christopher Nolan's BATMAN BEGINS. A disappointment, though a film where I can quite rightly declare that Jessica Alba does get naked in though...
