SPOILER-FREE MOVIE REVIEW
Marvel just don't seem to be showing any signs of slowing down now, are they?
Now the 14th film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (crazy how so many movies have been made since Iron Man exploded onto our screens back in 2008), Doctor Strange introduces us to the good doctor played by the extremely talented Benedict Cumberbatch in Marvel's attempt to add a little more oomph to its already star-studded lineup of characters in the vast universe.
I had absolutely zero knowledge of the comic book character of Doctor Strange before this movie so my mind was totally open to learning about this whole new universe of characters within an already-existing mega-universe. Too many darn universes to deal with man.
So, Doctor Strange.
Right from the get-go, we are given a wonderful display of visual effects prowess and just sheer quality production design and graphics with a very exciting action sequence involving The Ancient One (Tilda Swinton) and Kaecilius (Mads Mikkelsen) and his men.
It's a wonderful mix of Inception-esque world bending with just stunning visual effects which have become synonymous with the MCU's films (not Fox's X-Men: Apocalypse which had some pretty shoddy visuals at times). What makes this even better is that what we get at the start is just a taster of what's to come in terms of visuals because this film is just gorgeous.
If you thought Inception's visuals were trippy, wait till you see Doctor Strange's. It sort of amplifies that by infinity. Yes, Inception's visuals were great but this just blew me away. The bits that were super trippy and wacky I felt would have been even more epic when and if viewed in 3D, or IMAX 3D, or on LSD or any sort of drug.
On to the story, and I was very pleasantly surprised with how simplified they managed to make all the jargon and backstory. Going in, I expected to be so confused with all the comic book lingo that's so alien to me but no, I actually managed to understand what was going on so kudos to the writers for that.
There were many meaningful lessons taught by the characters throughout the movie, almost as if you're learning the same lesson as Dr. Strange is learning together. I thought that was pretty cool, and the manner in which The Ancient One kicks Dr. Strange out of his cocky self and back down to reality was pretty sweet.
I also liked the introduction of a new 'superpower' to the Marvel universe - magic.
So far, we've seen Tony Stark's tech, super soldiers, gods from other realms and green rage monsters, so to have some legit magic stuff introduced to the mix was very refreshing to see.
Personally, I like to look at movies as they are on their own, only referencing or comparing them to related films/films in the same series when necessary. In the case of Doctor Strange, I can't help but compare it to the original Iron Man because of just how similar they are thematically and structurally.
You have our main protagonist who is brilliant at what he does. So brilliant, in fact that he lets his brilliance get to his head, making him one heck of an egocentric douchebag. After a freak accident, his world comes tumbling down and he's left at an all-time low with an almost career/life-ending injury which makes him realise just how much of an ass he's been and hence goes on a journey of rediscovery.
Sound all too familiar in the case of Iron Man? Well, that's exactly what Doctor Strange was like, just with cool trippy magic instead of awesome Stark tech. It's just so formulaic.
But I guess that if something ain't broke, don't fix it, right? Since the formula works to an extent, I'll just give it the benefit of the doubt for now.
On to the movie's cast, and I just have to say that the cast was absolutely stellar now, wasn't it? Like five names out of six on the poster alone are all A-listers.
Let's begin with the titular character himself, played by the brilliant Benedict Cumberbatch. I thought he was excellent as Doctor Strange, playing him with a very apt and appropriate combination of cockiness and humour. His performance added layers to the character which was welcomed and as a result, made the character even more memorable.
We then have his somewhat love interest in the movie played by the very beautiful and talented Rachel McAdams. I thought she was good in her role which wasn't the clichéd sort of superhero movie love interest (thankfully). She appeared when and wherever her character was needed and no more or less. I thought that was really good handling of the character on the director's and writer's part.
I also really liked Mads Mikkelsen as the film's antagonist Kaecilius, a former student of The Ancient One who lost his way due to a lust for power and knowledge, turning him evil.
I've only seen Mads Mikkelsen in one other role, and that's of the villainous role of Le Chiffre in Daniel Craig's first outing as James Bond in 2006's Casino Royale. He was brilliant in that movie and is really good in Doctor Strange as well, just that perhaps he could have had a bit more screen time.
I think it's also nice how we're beginning to see more of Mikkelsen in mainstream stuff? He's appeared in this and he's also got a major role in the upcoming Rogue One: A Star Wars Story which I'm super stoked for. He's a terrific actor and I hope he gets even better roles in the years to come.
The rest of the supporting cast was alright. Chiwetel Ejiofor as Mordo was okay and Benedict Wong as... Wong, was okay as well.
Perhaps my biggest issue with the casting is that of Tilda Swinton in the role of The Ancient One. I did some research along with consulting my comic book fanatic friend Jeanne, and I learned that The Ancient One is supposed to be of Tibetan descent in the comics. So why the bloody hell is a white actress playing a character meant to be of colour?
This is a classic case of whitewashing in Hollywood. It seriously took me out of the film despite me already knowing of her casting.
When she pops up on screen for the first time, it's so jarring to see a white face after Dr. Strange roams around Kathmandu encountering numerous Nepalese natives. I'm just shocked at how the studio couldn't cast an actor of colour to play a character meant to be of colour.
I also learned that they changed the nationality of The Ancient One and all that comes along with the character from Tibetan to Nepalese as apparently, there's an issue the Chinese have with the Tibetan people? Hence, to avoid potentially losing their Chinese audience, Marvel simply changed the nationality of a major character in order to make more money. Come on, man. Tibet and Nepal are not the same.
Anyway, I delved much deeper into this issue of whitewashing in an earlier post which focused on racism in the film industry (Link: http://themoviefella.blogspot.co.uk/2016/11/racism-in-film.html) so I'll move on now.
On a more technical note, Doctor Strange is a very efficient movie.
It's shot pretty well, the visuals as aforementioned are brilliant, the music's pretty good (which is surprising given how lacklustre composer Michael Giacchino's recent scores have been) and the editing was excellent.
All in all, Doctor Strange was an enjoyable albeit formulaic adventure which introduced us to a whole new set of characters within the ever-expanding Marvel Cinematic Universe.
Despite the similarities it draws with fellow Marvel hero Iron Man, there's just about enough quality and substance in Doctor Strange to make it stand out within the massive universe.
The introduction of a new superpower in magic is pretty sweet and seeing it in action is an absolute visual treat. However, it could have done with a little more originality and perhaps a little stray away from formula could have made it a whole lot better.
The majority of the cast is really good (including Tilda Swinton), but the clear-as-day whitewashing of the character of The Ancient One truly knocked the film's progress off course in terms of likability and credibility. Let's be fair, no movie fan wants to hear that the production companies go for profits ahead of quality.
Personally, I think its 90% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes is absolute bollocks, showing again just how biased the damned site is towards MCU films.
It's not outstanding, but it isn't in any way terrible. If I had to describe the movie in a word or phrase, I'd say that it's 'good but could be a lot better'.
7.5/10.
Now the 14th film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (crazy how so many movies have been made since Iron Man exploded onto our screens back in 2008), Doctor Strange introduces us to the good doctor played by the extremely talented Benedict Cumberbatch in Marvel's attempt to add a little more oomph to its already star-studded lineup of characters in the vast universe.
I had absolutely zero knowledge of the comic book character of Doctor Strange before this movie so my mind was totally open to learning about this whole new universe of characters within an already-existing mega-universe. Too many darn universes to deal with man.
So, Doctor Strange.
Right from the get-go, we are given a wonderful display of visual effects prowess and just sheer quality production design and graphics with a very exciting action sequence involving The Ancient One (Tilda Swinton) and Kaecilius (Mads Mikkelsen) and his men.
It's a wonderful mix of Inception-esque world bending with just stunning visual effects which have become synonymous with the MCU's films (not Fox's X-Men: Apocalypse which had some pretty shoddy visuals at times). What makes this even better is that what we get at the start is just a taster of what's to come in terms of visuals because this film is just gorgeous.
If you thought Inception's visuals were trippy, wait till you see Doctor Strange's. It sort of amplifies that by infinity. Yes, Inception's visuals were great but this just blew me away. The bits that were super trippy and wacky I felt would have been even more epic when and if viewed in 3D, or IMAX 3D, or on LSD or any sort of drug.
On to the story, and I was very pleasantly surprised with how simplified they managed to make all the jargon and backstory. Going in, I expected to be so confused with all the comic book lingo that's so alien to me but no, I actually managed to understand what was going on so kudos to the writers for that.
There were many meaningful lessons taught by the characters throughout the movie, almost as if you're learning the same lesson as Dr. Strange is learning together. I thought that was pretty cool, and the manner in which The Ancient One kicks Dr. Strange out of his cocky self and back down to reality was pretty sweet.
I also liked the introduction of a new 'superpower' to the Marvel universe - magic.
So far, we've seen Tony Stark's tech, super soldiers, gods from other realms and green rage monsters, so to have some legit magic stuff introduced to the mix was very refreshing to see.
Personally, I like to look at movies as they are on their own, only referencing or comparing them to related films/films in the same series when necessary. In the case of Doctor Strange, I can't help but compare it to the original Iron Man because of just how similar they are thematically and structurally.
You have our main protagonist who is brilliant at what he does. So brilliant, in fact that he lets his brilliance get to his head, making him one heck of an egocentric douchebag. After a freak accident, his world comes tumbling down and he's left at an all-time low with an almost career/life-ending injury which makes him realise just how much of an ass he's been and hence goes on a journey of rediscovery.
Sound all too familiar in the case of Iron Man? Well, that's exactly what Doctor Strange was like, just with cool trippy magic instead of awesome Stark tech. It's just so formulaic.
But I guess that if something ain't broke, don't fix it, right? Since the formula works to an extent, I'll just give it the benefit of the doubt for now.
On to the movie's cast, and I just have to say that the cast was absolutely stellar now, wasn't it? Like five names out of six on the poster alone are all A-listers.
Let's begin with the titular character himself, played by the brilliant Benedict Cumberbatch. I thought he was excellent as Doctor Strange, playing him with a very apt and appropriate combination of cockiness and humour. His performance added layers to the character which was welcomed and as a result, made the character even more memorable.
We then have his somewhat love interest in the movie played by the very beautiful and talented Rachel McAdams. I thought she was good in her role which wasn't the clichéd sort of superhero movie love interest (thankfully). She appeared when and wherever her character was needed and no more or less. I thought that was really good handling of the character on the director's and writer's part.
I also really liked Mads Mikkelsen as the film's antagonist Kaecilius, a former student of The Ancient One who lost his way due to a lust for power and knowledge, turning him evil.
I've only seen Mads Mikkelsen in one other role, and that's of the villainous role of Le Chiffre in Daniel Craig's first outing as James Bond in 2006's Casino Royale. He was brilliant in that movie and is really good in Doctor Strange as well, just that perhaps he could have had a bit more screen time.
I think it's also nice how we're beginning to see more of Mikkelsen in mainstream stuff? He's appeared in this and he's also got a major role in the upcoming Rogue One: A Star Wars Story which I'm super stoked for. He's a terrific actor and I hope he gets even better roles in the years to come.
The rest of the supporting cast was alright. Chiwetel Ejiofor as Mordo was okay and Benedict Wong as... Wong, was okay as well.
Perhaps my biggest issue with the casting is that of Tilda Swinton in the role of The Ancient One. I did some research along with consulting my comic book fanatic friend Jeanne, and I learned that The Ancient One is supposed to be of Tibetan descent in the comics. So why the bloody hell is a white actress playing a character meant to be of colour?
This is a classic case of whitewashing in Hollywood. It seriously took me out of the film despite me already knowing of her casting.
When she pops up on screen for the first time, it's so jarring to see a white face after Dr. Strange roams around Kathmandu encountering numerous Nepalese natives. I'm just shocked at how the studio couldn't cast an actor of colour to play a character meant to be of colour.
I also learned that they changed the nationality of The Ancient One and all that comes along with the character from Tibetan to Nepalese as apparently, there's an issue the Chinese have with the Tibetan people? Hence, to avoid potentially losing their Chinese audience, Marvel simply changed the nationality of a major character in order to make more money. Come on, man. Tibet and Nepal are not the same.
Anyway, I delved much deeper into this issue of whitewashing in an earlier post which focused on racism in the film industry (Link: http://themoviefella.blogspot.co.uk/2016/11/racism-in-film.html) so I'll move on now.
On a more technical note, Doctor Strange is a very efficient movie.
It's shot pretty well, the visuals as aforementioned are brilliant, the music's pretty good (which is surprising given how lacklustre composer Michael Giacchino's recent scores have been) and the editing was excellent.
All in all, Doctor Strange was an enjoyable albeit formulaic adventure which introduced us to a whole new set of characters within the ever-expanding Marvel Cinematic Universe.
Despite the similarities it draws with fellow Marvel hero Iron Man, there's just about enough quality and substance in Doctor Strange to make it stand out within the massive universe.
The introduction of a new superpower in magic is pretty sweet and seeing it in action is an absolute visual treat. However, it could have done with a little more originality and perhaps a little stray away from formula could have made it a whole lot better.
The majority of the cast is really good (including Tilda Swinton), but the clear-as-day whitewashing of the character of The Ancient One truly knocked the film's progress off course in terms of likability and credibility. Let's be fair, no movie fan wants to hear that the production companies go for profits ahead of quality.
Personally, I think its 90% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes is absolute bollocks, showing again just how biased the damned site is towards MCU films.
It's not outstanding, but it isn't in any way terrible. If I had to describe the movie in a word or phrase, I'd say that it's 'good but could be a lot better'.
7.5/10.
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