Hancock (2008) Movie Review, Trailer and Poster

USA 2008
Director: Peter Berg
Cast: Will Smith, Charlize Theron, Jason Bateman, Jae Head, Johnny Galecki, Maetrix Fitten
Rating: PG-13
Release Date: 2 July 2008
Running Time: 1 hour 42 minutes

The Movie Review

At last another superhero movie that thinks outside the box... After having watched the unique premise of My Super Ex-Girlfriend (2006) where the superheroine is a jealous and wacky girl played by Uma Thurman, now we have a drunk and hippy superhero played by Will Smith. and What a movie to start this month of July which will see another superhero movies like Hellboy II: The Golden Army (2008) and The Dark Knight (2008) in the following weeks and Punisher: War Zone (2008) in August. Even though Hancock has to compete with Iron Man (2008) and The Incredible Hulk (2008) that have been released earlier this year.

Hancock is one weird and careless superhero alright. He often helps the people of Los Angeles but in doing so Hancock


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also doesn't care about public property and most of the time wrecks them which cost the city millions of dollars of losses, while drunk sometimes. Most citizens of the city dislike Hancock for his indifferent behavior, but one man named Ray Embrey thinks different of him. After Hancock (Will Smith) saves him from death, Ray Embrey (Jason Bateman) determines to make the public to love Hancock by teaching him how to behave politely. And his first big act is by sending Hancock to jail (duh...a superhero in jail) to make the public misses him after seeing the crime rate towering. There is another problem though, Hancock starts to feel really close to Ray Embrey's wife Mary (Charlize Theron) and this relationship will reveals more about Hancock than he has ever imagined.

Hancock is one of those rare superhero movies that are not based on comic books and so this movie is responsible to give sudden love strike to the audience. This is quite a hefty job compared to other superhero movies that already have their own fan bases and so the premise of Hancock has to be unique. As a matter of fact, the unique premise of Hancock is actually works. The opening scene of Hancock although already a cliché in the superhero ability standpoint but seeing a superhero wearing unlikely outfit accompanied by hip hop music and a touch of comedy, we could already tell that Hancock is different.

Will Smith, as always, performs convincingly, as the drunken superhero and with a suitable script Smith successfully portrays a superhero with real human side with a more grown-up psychological problem. Quite different with Spider-man/Peter Parker who has a believable human side (and a great emotional involvement) but Spider-man's problem actually common in the superhero realm. The soon-to-be 33-year-old Charlize Theron although not performing her best, she could mingle well enough with other characters.

Hancock also good for its cinematography, Most of Hancock's action scenes take place in the open space in the city of Los Angeles instead of inside a warehouse/building so they're feel closer to the real life and with decent visual effects, Hancock's is fairly enjoyable.

Nevertheless every superhero has their own flaw(s), moreover some of superhero movies do have big flaws. And Hancock's biggest flaw is that there isn't enough action (and even drama) to see in Hancock, ironically it might appeal to fellow moviegoers who want to see superhero movie thick with comedy air. And I hate being nitpicker, but the history of Hancock is just unbelievably weird..., Okay...what's not unbelievable about other superhero's story as well, right? But Hancock doesn't provide any glimpse/scene to his past and it seems the story is still half-baked. Maybe if there is a sequel to Hancock, the filmmakers owe an explanation to the audience, or probably they should make a prequel instead of a sequel.

© iwan pranowo of Movielogy.com