Welcome to my Nightmare

Rating: 6/10 (29 March 2016)

My first reaction when walking out of the movie theatre was exhaustion. Once again, for the sake of being a Big Blockbuster, the filmmakers feel the need to extend the runtime to 2 hours and 30 minutes. As the audience was first starting to get pummeled with scenes of gravitas one after the other, I felt a good vibe going. The energy was flowing, pacing seemed good. Then came the flashback/nightmares. The film decided to surround the story, from the very first frame, with flashbacks. But perhaps to break the monotony, the flashbacks were morphed into nightmares. OK sure, it breaks the monotony, and adds more running time, but they didn't make much sense. Perhaps halfway through the film, when another confusing nightmare played out, the vibe went from excited to WTF?
Then it hit me. My God, they've taken both of these franchises and turned them into Michael Bay movies. Michael Bay movies are trademark all commercial and no substance bombastic extravaganzas.
Tonally, this film is a mess. Wisely, it finds it's footing and stays more with the Batman story arc. But cramming in the Superman arc as a separate but equal focus of the film was probably never really workable. Complaints that there is no humour to the tale comes from the fact that there is so much to for the audience to buy-in already with this siamese twin of a film, that any moments of levity would damage the already uncertain tone. The biggest casualty from this is the Lex Luthor character. His tone was supposed to be crazy and dark, but could still have had a comic side (done with great success by Gene Hackman). His character never solidified into an identifiable persona that we could love to hate.
Another complaint about this film is "where is the fun"? This is supposed to be an event film. Again, the poorly assembled action scenes could have steered us into fun action setups. But they were rushed along too much. It has much more favorably going for it than not, and all that $250 million budget is definitely up there on the screen. The cinematography by Larry Fong always has a larger than life feel, and is gorgeous to watch. But what was the point of the subplot about a secret government bullet that seemed to lead to nowhere? And why scenes of political quibbling (was George Lucas a script adviser?).
Oh, yes there is supposedly a huge shocking thing that happens to one of the main characters at the end of the film. But nobody in the crowded theatre bought it for one second.
Ultimately it comes down voting with my head or my heart. My heart has a weakness for big budget action spectacles as long as it has some original angle. My head becomes annoyed with the overstuffed and overlong plot. I would say a very tepid thumbs up to see it on the big screen for the event movie it is, but maybe find a cheaper matinée and skip the 3D.
UPDATE - Comments on "Ultimate Version" versus Theatrical Version. *MAJOR SPOILERS*
I just recently viewed the 'ultimate' version of Batman v Superman and thought I would share some comments. First of all, one of the primary reasons the theatrical release was not accepted well was because of the shift from dark to light in terms of tone for recent movies. Star Wars shifted to a more light tone (as evidenced by the reshoots of "Rogue One"), and even "Deadpool" helped declare that audiences wanted to be entertained and have fun at the movies. Enough of the sad and dark stuff.
Here are the primary benefits of the longer cut:
Lex Luthor's character is fleshed out. Almost as if to respond to complaints about how disjointed his appearance was in the film, the 'ultimate' cut let's him talk about his father and his misfit as new CEO.
Metropolis versus Gotham Subtheme. The football game of Metropolis versus Gotham represents the subtheme of Superman versus Batman. The screenwriters included several more lines by almost all the characters relating to how crime ridden Gotham is, and how much Metropolis is in love with Superman.
Some of the extra scenes were better left out:
Klark Kent gets further angered by talking to people about Batman being a menace. Almost all of them were about the branding, which felt too repetitive in the longer cut.
Extra Violence. There are even more shots of people being riddled with bullets, or other acts of violence that make this film feel like a hard 'R' rated film. There are extra gritty scenes in the prison that feel really out of place in a superhero movie. Of course, that was the general dark direction the Batman series had gone under director Christopher Nolan. But you sense that there is a line where the audience is being turned off.
Which is version if Better? No question the longer cut is better. The narrative flows smoother, giving characters more screen time that was needed. I complained that the theatrical cut felt like a Michael Bay movie. The ultimate version definitely never feels that way. I felt the extra time with Klark helped give him the equal weight needed to give the final showdown a better setup.
Even so, both versions suffer from too many subplots. So the 'ultimate' version is still quite overbloated, but yet more watchable at nearly 3 hours. Perhaps they should have included an intermission, like the old roadshow movies of the 50's?
As mentioned earlier, you must accept this movie for what it is with it's dark gritty tone. The timing of the release was unfortunate, but will probably be better respected in the future.