Solid, well made superhero adventure,but lacks the "epic" quality of X-Men or "Spider-Man"

Rating: 6/10 (8 October 2005)

To put things in perspective, imagine how you (as a fan of superhero themed movies) would have felt if there had been no "Spider-Man 1 and 2" or "X-Men 1 and 2", and this movie had come out in the long hiatus following the disastrous, embarrassing bombs that were "Batman and Robin" and "Superman IV: The Quest For Peace". I am sure that you would have been delighted beyond all reckoning with the quality of the story, acting, and SFX in "Fantastic Four".
Seriously, this is a well made movie with excellent acting, a decent story line, and reasonably satisfying sets, costumes and effects. I've followed the comic since its heyday with Lee and Kirby, and even picked up the two "Ultimate Fantastic Four" collections (featuring modern day revamps of the characters free of 35+ years of Marvel continuity demands), and I felt that the movie did a respectable job of conveying the characters & family dynamics that are the heart of the FF storyline. So yes, it's a fine movie, and if X-Men and Spidey hadn't set the bar so high, this movie would have set the high water mark for all superhero efforts to follow. It certainly beats the kitty-litter out of "Catwoman" and "Daredevil". (Although I liked "Daredevil" just fine -say 6.5 out of 10.)
How and where the does movie miss the leap to greatness? I think some of the problem lies in the size of the cast of characters and the scale of the story about them. "Spidey" is essentially a tight little story about the hero's coming of age, involving a young man, the love of his life, and the supervillian that represents his mirror image. X-Men is about alienation and bigotry, and features half-a-dozen good mutants and half-a-dozen bad ones locked in an ideological struggle for the future of mankind, involving sprawling superhero firefights. But "FF" is locked somewhere in between - it's about family and about four people and their nemesis (Doctor Doom). But they don't really have a REASON to be at odds other than the fact that Doom blames the "FF" for his problems and wants revenge. Family dramas can be compelling and thrilling, but they are hardly ever grand scale epics, and they also tend to miss the intimacy of a character study of a single hero.
The other problem is that someone already made a "Fantastic Four" movie about the power of family, and it was called "The Incredibles". Pixar set the bar for that kind of story so high that a live action version of the same story inevitably has a kind of 'me too' quality that keeps it from classic status.
As for the 'live' actors: I see a lot of grief being tossed Ioan Gruffudd's way for his relatively subdued performance as "Mister Fantastic", but I would like to point out that this was a DELIBERATE CHOICE of the actor and the director, kept in sync with the idea of an introspective egghead scientist. If you pay attention, Gruffudd is actually an incredibly handsome man who dials his (undoubtedly enormous) ego down to allow the other male actors room to breath and shine on their own merits. I also have to say that the young actor who plays the hothead Human Torch is incredibly appealing on camera ad adds a lot to any scene he is in. The guy from "The Shield" also does a good, solid job, especially acting under pounds and pounds of prosthetics and costume
Since I am a straight male, it almost goes without saying that Jessica Alba seriously carbonates my hormones, but the makeup folks does appear to have overdone things a little bit with the skin bronzer. Whatever.
So: a good enjoyable movie, which will go right on my shelf next to "The Incredibles" when the DVD price drops under $15. But I will still watch "The Incredibles" and "X-Men" a lot more often.