Artemis Fowl

June 17, 2020 at 10:56 am | Posted in 2020 | 1 Comment
Tags: Colin Farrell, Fantasy, Ferdia Shaw, Josh Gad, Judi Dench, Kenneth Branagh, Movie Review, Nonso Anozie

∅

“All is not well; I doubt some foul play,” Hamlet warns us. The first time I saw a Kenneth Branagh movie was an adaptation of Shakespeare that he directed and starred in. I loved it. Probably because I was too young to think about the directorial choices he made, and because his penchant for melodrama well suited the material. But in his recent works (think of “Murder on the Orient Express”), his heavy-handedness has hung over the film like an anxious mother smothering her child. I cannot say what this film would have been like with another director, but this version was just awful. Branagh seems to get a perverse glee out of hitting every overwrought cliche he can think of, as when he has a dwarf listening to Journey. Not only is the idea of creating humor by pairing powerful/magical characters with pop music completely ripped off from better films, but Branagh overplays the scene by having the dwarf explain what he’s listening to, just in case we missed the joke. In another example, the camera faces up from the floor at the feet of the boy and we watch a bottle of milk fall and explode above us. Gosh, I’ve never seen that before. And, worse, this trick disengages the audience; it is meant to show us the boy’s shock but it’s a poor substitute for actual acting. The faces of the actors is what draws us into a film. However, the young boy who plays the eponymous lead (Ferdia Shaw) monotonously recites his lines, dull-eyed and expressionless, as though his adolescent brain cannot be any more bored with the film it finds itself in. This is not helped by the fact that Artemis is a wholly unlikeable child. One of the things that made “Harry Potter” a character that the audience rooted for, was that he was so unsure of himself. Artemis, on the other hand, is utterly arrogant. He is portrayed as perfect in everything he does, and smarter than every single other person, adults included. As such, he is insufferable. It’s hard to root for someone who you really want to punch in the face. Why did I even bother with this film, you ask? I was drawn to to it because it has the great Dame Judi Dench. I was curious how she would do in a fantasy film. But, she appeared to know exactly how horrendous this film is; she looked pissed off in every scene, as though she had just been told she needs a root canal. I have not even started on the dialogue. It was painfully wooden and sounded unnaturally like a script and not real conversation. It never elicited the emotion that Branagh seemed to want it to. I could go on, but I will simply share this: at one point, Judi stepped off her ship and delivered what was clearly meant to be the “do you feel lucky, punk” line of the movie. The faeries are coming to kick your ass. What does she say? “Top o’ tha mornin’ to ya,” with an expression that suggests she just watched someone take a shit on the lawn. A friend tried to warn me not to watch the film. He texted me with, “Artemis Fowl was fucking awful.” He was far too kind. A foul play, indeed.