Great; For Children...

Rating: 3/10 (12 December 2019)

I loved the original "The Avengers" film (1961). For this version, however, it is far different. In my opinion, any actor who takes a role in this film or similar can only have 1 (or bith) of 2 reasons: The money and making children happy. I fully appreciate both. Unfortunately for fans, if you are over the age of 13 years old and enjoy this, well good for you. For me, I think anyone older who participates in watching this (or similar) type of film, it is exactly what is ruining the cinematic "universe", for lack of a better word. Please don't misunderstand me; there is a place for "comic book" movies. Unfortunately, they are so heavily packaged and promoted, it is detracting from the world of artistic films. If I sound snobbish, so be it. Director Martin Scorcese was recently quoted in a British TV interview (BBC?). In it, he pointed out this situation: The heavy promotion, packaging and large numbers of this type of film has caused more and more independent theaters to close. He received a large number of complaints from fans of Marvel Comics, DC Comics, etc. In response to this "pushback" he wrote an Op-ed in the New York Times. In it he could have taken the words from my mouth. It is a shame. When I lived in New York City from the 1980s until 2016, there were many more independent theaters. Not only smaller places like "Angelika Film Center", which (fortunately) has expanded to other cities, or "The Film Forum", or "The Quad"; but all the large independent theaters in Times Square. They were torn down and replaced with hotels and/or other types of buildings. This was all a big part of Rudolph Giuliani's tenure as mayor. His "Quality of Life Issues". Yes, he succeeded in arresting people or issuing citations to (mostly homeless) people for panhandling, or "squeegee boys" at traffic bottlenecks who would wipe your windshield with buckets of dirty water. He talked about (I'm paraphrasing) "Cleaning up the pornos and peep shows" in Times Square. Well, he did this, and then some. Unfortunately, the large theaters I just mentioned went out the window, too. He turned turned Times Square into "Disneyworld". Prior to this "ravagement", I used to love going to Times Square late on a Friday or Saturday night, and catch a midnight or 1:00 AM showing of some big new action film, like "Terminator: Judgement Day", or "Lethal Weapon". It was fun, simply because the audience participated. They were loud and raucus, which fit this type of film perfectly. It was great! On the other hand, if I wanted to see a great new independent film (quietly), I would typically go to Angelika Film Center. I did this because I lived only a few streets west, just off of Houston Street in Soho. I could walk there in less than 5 minutes (door to door). Anyway, if you enjoy thiskind of movie, great. All I am saying is be aware of the "big picture", which Mr. Scorcese so eloquently wrote about.