Nothing Spectacular

Rating: 5/10 (14 August 2005)

With other comic book films such as Spider-man, X-men and more recently Batman, bringing the comic to life and generating wide appeal and high amounts of entertainment, Fantastic four leaves a lot to be desired. Fantastic four tells the story of five individuals who go on a mission in outer space and after being caught in a storm develop different super-powers. Four of these use their powers to stop the Dr. Doom carrying out his plans and using his power for evil.
The fantastic four does reach a young audience and will generate a lot of money, however it is not really that good a film. Although the film is aimed at the under 12's it does manage to neglect appealing to all other age groups through lack of substance and plot. Fantastic four has its problems, most of which lie with the direction of Tim Story. One thing about the direction I didn't like was the transitions throughout the film are not clear and have an effect on the flow of the film . Also it feels like Story has relied on the big budget CGI's to carry the film rather than making the actors he's got work with a messy script.
The general essence of this film is the characters trying to establish themselves and develop as superheroes and little else is memorable about the plot. One thing I would have liked to have seen is more of a rivalry between the heroes and the villains to develop in this film as the other marvel comics films have been able to manage e.g. X-men, The Punisher, Spider-man. This, however, is possibly due to the short length of the film and having to cram other stuff in. Having said this fantastic four doesn't really have much else in terms of story except the lacklustre romance element with Mr Fantastic and The invisible girl.
Julian McMahon brings a small element of darkness to the film, however, this is only a crumb of what is needed to give this film and the characters some depth and engross and adult audience. I don't think Julian McMahon had much of a chance to act in this film as he does in nip/tuck where he is able to bring some real emotion to the character and the show, this can probably be attributed to the fact in Fantastic Four he had some pretty awful lines to deliver, which ultimately reflect a poor and cheesy writing.