‘Aquaman’ Drowns Despite ‘Matrix’ Moves, ‘TRON: Legacy’ Look and ‘King Arthur’ Plot

Upon entering the Monster Screen Emagine theater in Rogers, Minnesota for DC’s Aquaman during its opening weekend, I was shocked that almost the entire theater was empty as the trailers were about to roll. It was 9:45 p.m. on Friday night–the last of the film’s screenings in its first official day in theaters, with Thursday night showings raising just $13.7 million domestically and $332 million international, paced by Chinese moviegoers. How could a movie that filled so many seats the night before be empty in its second night in theaters?

It took all of 15 minutes to get my answer, when the ageless and fantastic Nicole Kidman, portraying Atlanna, Queen of Atlantis and mother of Arthur–half man, half Aquaman–returns to the water to save her son’s life. She gives the only motivated, emotionally realistic performance amongst the entire cast, including Willem Dafoe. Dafoe is almost always more morose than most, with his Green Goblin in Spider-man a personal best bad temper and his Klaus in The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou the setting the floor for his ill-temperedness.

Dafoe is his usual self as Vulka, Arthur’s teacher and trainer in flashbacks, but he’s a different sort of sullen in the presence of his King Orm (Patrick Wilson), whom he now, spoiler alert, “serves.” I feel like Dafoe is simply conveying a genuine frustration with how little Wilson gave him to work with in their exchanges. If Jim Carrey is the overactor, Wilson, in this case, is the underactor. Marvel has spoiled us with Tom Hiddleston’s Loki, but for someone waging a war against humanity, Wilson is uncomfortably underemotional. I’m not saying he needs to be as resentful or emotional as Loki. Frankly, I wasn’t told nearly enough about him to know how he should feel, but Orm isn’t comfortable enough with waging war to pass as insane, nor is he conflicted enough to pass as a realistic character who could exist in the world.

I’ve seldom seen movies more predictable than Aquaman, and that’s because the movie is little more than a mashup of previous box office successes buoyed by cinematic elements incapable of keeping a film afloat. It’s as if most of Aquaman‘s budget went to animators instead of actors and writers and directors. The underwater production design is impressive, but elaborate, colorful sets can’t carry a film. The beauty of The Grid did not carry TRON: Legacy to success, but the Aquaman producers seemed to think otherwise, creating an underwater, profusely pastel version of The Grid, complete with a reenactment of the scene in which Sam Flynn escapes Clu and the games thanks to Quorra escorting him off grid. Arthur, or Aquaman, attempted by Jason Momoa, escapes a similar situation with the help of Mera, for whom Amber Heard suffers the suffocating absence of motivation in the sea of Momoa.

Speaking of Arthur, the plot of Aquaman is King Arthur or The Sword in the Stone set in a wetter version of The Grid with a sibling rivalry that fails to compare with that of Marvel’s Thor and Loki, but also fails the viewer by refusing to replicate real emotion. Their acting was so disenchanting they made Dolph Lundgren’s King Nereus the third best performance in the film. He was billed sixth to give you an idea of how few accomplished actors were cast by longtime co-casting directors Anne McCarthy and Kellie Roy, whose best casting work was mostly done for them in Furious 7.

This was McCarthy and Roy’s chance to make their names, but they were handcuffed by Momoa’s apparent inability to do much more than deliver one-liners with poor timing and pace. It wasn’t as noticeable when he was battling for screen time with other accomplished actors and actresses of the Justice League in Justice League. But there was no saving this sinking ship because Aquaman was sick and infected every crewmember with whom he came in contact. It’s hard for anyone to provide a performance that’s convincingly motivated when the leading man can’t provide the proper motivation. Motivation is what makes us do things, and it’s what makes good acting. A good performance is one that seems to an audience as realistic…believable

Acting isn’t reading lines and conveying the emotion you think the writer intended. Acting is reacting. Your partner(s) in the scene work of you and you them, reacting to your reactions as naturally as possible, and Momoa’s reactions offered little for drama developing. Even Kidman’s performance suffered because of Momoa’s struggle to not only convey emotion, but determine which emotion to convey. He looked like he was searching for how he should feel in the split-second closeup of him embracing his mother, spoiler alert, thought to be dead. There were no tears. In fact, Kidman shed more tears than the rest of the cast combined. There was no smile. Not even his embrace felt genuine, and while it would be understandable to be confused, even hesitant, that can’t be your closeup face during a hug, which is why the closeup was cut short and a wide, overhead shot was used to close the scene. You can be mad that she left or happy you’ve found her, but the worst look you can make in that moment is a “WTF” face.

Neither Momoa or Wilson seem to have any interest in actually acting interested. Sure, they don’t have a history like Marvel brothers Thor and Loki, but considering the fact Orm lost his mother to sacrifice for giving birth to the halfbreed Arthur, he’s not too damn upset about it. He calmly tells Arthur he’s “conflicted,” which might be the best word to describe both their performances–conflicted as to what feelings they should convey–as if they’ve never felt before.

Nobody except Manta, portrayed by Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, ever tests the boundaries of the spectrum of emotions. He wants to be Black Panther‘s Erik Killmonger but doesn’t have the screen time to establish much of his backstory. He doesn’t have much dialogue either, except to say he wants to avenge his father’s death by killing Aquaman–three times, in three different ways.

Unfortunately for Manta, his costume designer (Kym Barrett, The Matrix) or one of the art directors destroys any reason the audience might have to fear him by dressing him in a ridiculously oversized, non-threatening helmet reminiscent of TRON: Legacy music producers Daft Punk, with red, mantis eyes bigger than those of fellow EDM, headgear Hall-of-Famer Deadmau5. The helmet in the DC comics is certainly oversized, as are the heads of all villains, but it’s also menacing. Black Manta is just cuter with his helmet. He was more menacing as just Manta because he was the only character besides Kidman’s using his face to convey emotion.

Director James Wan shoulders a lot of the blame for not being able to pry performances from his actors. He too was part of the Furious 7 team, which is also his most successful project as a director. Are you catching the pattern here? Most of this crew’s experience has been obtained in the horror genre, cutting teeth making Saw and The Conjuring. Their biggest budgeted film was the seventh in a series of stunt flicks with established actors playing established characters who instinctively know how their characters would react in any situation.

In the case of casting directors McCarthy and Roy, filling out the roster with role players is a lot easier than casting a supporting actor and actress to pair with your superstar. It’s obvious that Wan, McCarthy, and Roy were out of their element, but they earned the opportunity by putting asses in seats for over a decade, which is apparently enough to launch a blockbuster, comic book, movie franchise these days. But they still haven’t made a film that’s any good, and the fact they got to play parents to the Aquaman franchise goes to show that there are far too many comic book movies being made.

Tim Burton already had one of his many masterpieces, Beetlejuice, in the can before birthing the comic book movie craze with Batman in 1989–still the best comic book movie ever made. Aquaman may very well be one of the worst. I’d watch Batman & Robin before I watched Aquaman again. At least George Clooney’s performance as Batman and Bruce Wayne was motivated. He thought Batman was gay, an understandable assumption given his familiarity with the Adam West television show. An assumption that was affirmed in Clooney’s mind when he saw his bat suit, complete with rubber nipples.

That’s why it’s so exciting that Cathy Yan will direct The Birds of Prey after her Sundance success, Dead Pigs. Comic book movie franchises were awarded to directors who’d proven themselves by making objectively good cinema that also fill the seats. Remember when Evil Dead legend Sam Raimi web-slung Spider-man into the stratosphere with the most uncharacteristic and arguably most perfect portrayer of the nerdy superhero in Tobey Maguire? Bryan Singer had already directed his masterpiece, The Usual Suspects, before launching the X-men franchise and giving the comic book film frenzy the steroid injection that made the dollars come in bunches. Now the dollars are just coming from a different place.

The only moments in Aquaman I appreciated were the references to our polluting of waterways in all its forms, which I had hoped would be the reason for Orm’s war on humanity. It was. Had Aquaman gone on for two hours and 23 minutes without addressing the islands of plastic pollution forming in our oceans or the dumping of toxic chemicals into rivers that find their way to the oceans, it would have been a complete and utter failure as a film. It did not entertain. It did not invoke emotion. But it might educate kids and keep some garbage out of the oceans. At least I didn’t have to pay for it, but I regret driving to the theater. All the empty seats were indicative of a lot of good decisions being made.

While Aquaman has already raised more than twice its $160-million production budget, I can’t see it making too much more in the states. I can’t speak for the Chinese because I don’t know how a translation would alter the dialogue of the film or even what cut of the film they’re seeing. Maybe theirs is better than ours. If it was even a second shorter than two hours and 23 minutes, it is better than what we sat through.

Hollywood might be catering to Chinese moviegoers for their Renminbi, but DC Comics is in no position to be setting a franchise low in objective film quality after almost setting that low with Justice League a year ago. That’s back-to-back turds for money with another risky release in Shazam! coming in April 2019 before Margot Robbie’s Harley Quinn saves the DC cinematic franchise with The Birds of Prey in February 2020–already pushed ahead of Suicide Squad 2.

I did speak to a few American moviegoers at the theater, one of whom said Aquaman was “not a very good film.” That’s putting it incredibly lightly in my informed opinion. (I have a degree in Motion Picture/Video/Theatre, so I like to think I know a good movie when I see one.) Aquaman should remain in Atlantis, never to return, except when the Justice League needs him to deliver one-liners and walk shirtless carrying his trident.