Monday 23 April 2012

Catwoman (2004) - ★

This is one of those movies that you hear nothing but bad things about, thus making it irresistible to watch. I was hoping for one of those 'It's so bad it's good' films, but instead I sat through 100 minutes of pure garbage. This could've been a great superhero movie such as Spiderman or The Dark Night Batman series. Unfortunately plain old bad acting, special effects that look like they belong in a TV-movie, an unconvincing screenplay of hazy plots and ridiculous dialogue made this one of the most downright awful pile of cinema I've seen in a long time.

Halle Berry attempts to play a shy and plain looking artist for a beauty company that constantly makes mistakes but pulls off a brave smile afterwards. This is director Pitof's lazy attempt to make her a relatable friend of the viewer. Even when they made Berry up to look 'normal' she was still beautiful which made Patience's transition to Catwoman that much less exciting. It was impossible to root for this girl because she had hardly any redeeming qualities such as intelligence, self-respect and class. We were quickly introduced to the bad guys, her bosses Laurel and George Hedare. Simply put, I guessed who the evil mastermind was the second I saw them. After that, the rest of the film was horribly predictable.

About twenty minutes into the movie we are left waiting for Patience to become Catwoman, fight crime, encounter a problem, fix the problem and then live happily ever after. That is what happened exactly in that order, except the ending left us waiting for a sequel that never happened (Thank God). One could go on forever about what was wrong with the story, but the acting was just as bad. Berry used her womanly assets and wore a leather catsuit. That was the highlight of her performance. The hilarious Alex Borstein had no good dialogue to work with. She played the cliché best friend that made up for her average looks with a great personality. As if she had no life of her own, she just sat and listened to Patience's problems the whole movie which was frustrating.

I'm sure back in 2004 the effects seemed much better to the viewer in terms of utilizing new technology to create something different from any other movie. There were whole scenes where Catwoman and her mysterious cat were completely CG. It was extremely unnecessary and added to the further detachment to the storyline by being so unbelievable. This is usually the part where I would name one good quality of the film, but I just can't this time. Time was taken from me that I will never get back after seeing this film. Don't be fooled into watching Catwoman just to see how bad it is. I did that and regret it deeply.



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