Shazam!

In this modern sea of superhero content, it is a little surprising that one as historically important (both in terms of comics and the superhero as a multimedia figure) as the original Captain Marvel, now known as Shazam, hadn’t received the big screen treatment again, until now. Even before Man of Steel it wasn’t like there wasn’t plenty of visual Superman imagery to borrow from – some of which this character actually helped create in the first place. The Big Red Cheese had the easiest Hollywood elevator pitch of any of these properties: Big, but if he also turned into a superhero. That was the sales pitch going into Shazam!, and director David F. Sandberg (Lights Out) largely sticks to that scheme as he delivers another enjoyable enough DC superhero film as Warner Bros. continues to pull out of the doldrums that was Justice League.

Shazam! is inspired by the New 52 incarnation of the character, that saw the character go away from being called Captain Marvel to Shazam, even though that doesn’t quite make sense, and is a running gag throughout the film. A young Billy Batson(Asher Angel) is on the run from foster home to foster home in search of his biological mother in the Philadelphia area. After being put in another group home, and demonstrating he may not be as hard-bitten as he tries to put on, Batson is soon called upon by the aged wizard Shazam to take his powers and become his new champion. Meanwhile, the villainous Dr. Sivanna searches for the means to unlock the Seven Deadly Sins and usurp the wizard’s champion. Shazam! is a bit of an absurd, or eccentric, property that this film doesn’t shy away from in the ways you’d expect. It isn’t quite the magical Superman movie of your dreams, but is closer to magic Spider-man. Shazam! continues the streak of Warner Bros., or technically their sister studio New Line, taking the right note from Marvel Studios and building a film that should sell their heroic characters first. Things get a little muddled, but you leave things with a good idea of who Billy and his marvelous family are. The casting of the supporting kids is all around stellar that helps to make this movie into a pleasing all around modern family affair,

Once Billy is able to transform into the Wizard’s champion, Zachary Levi comes into the picture. Overall the former star of Chuck is well cast and gives a good performance. Levi’s timing for the physical comedy and ability to maneuver through scenes like a toddler learning to walk earn much of the comedy when Billy and Freddie try to figure it out what it is exactly he can do. It even makes up some of the rougher verbal joking land a bit better. The only shortfall is the feeling of disconnect between Levi’s high pitched, well-caffeinated, energy and Asher Angel’s more subdued performance. The duo leads don’t come across as two aspects of the same character, Levi just acts like a literal man-child. The domineering presence Levi brings leaves Angel’s Billy, and the characters emotional arc, to the wayside until the requisite Dark Knight of the Soul moment. This dramatic turn was effectively handled but also felt rushed and underdeveloped. Angel and Levi’s dissonant performances are at the center of the films tonal short comings.

The dissonance between the two Billys is indicative of the films overall tonal clash between the earnest, nostalgic, children adventure/family movies of the 80’s and the self-awareness of superhero comedies Deadpool and Kick-Ass. Most of this dissonance centers around the film’s treatment of violence and overall destruction wrought by super powered beings. This tonal clash is best demonstrated as an empowered Dr. Sivanna interrupts a board meeting with his estranged family. The first half of this sequence is indebted to the climatic boardroom finale from the original Robocop, except due to the PG-13 rating Shazam! can’t explode a body in a hail of gunfire. Instead the film hangs in the shocked board room for a couple of extra beats as you hear Sivanna’s older brother plummet to his death. The excessive force Sivanna and Shazam create is often played for laughs but left unseen, from Shazam punching Sivanna below the belt to Shazam failing to leap a tall building in a single bound. It is unable to show the human cost as it parodies the relatively minor (by genre standards) property damage and it never quite comes together. Meanwhile the second half of the board room sequence plays more effectively as Sandberg leans into his horror roots as the Sins consume the rest of the board room in a mass of monstrous and freighted human shadows set to a cacophony of scary sounds. Shazam! sits in an awkward spot were it cannot fully reclaim the edge of earlier pre-PG-13 films or fully commit to the excess of self-aware comedies like Deadpool.

Shazam! asserts a surprising amount of self-awareness for a product that is supposed to be taking place in the larger story world of the DCEU. Previous instances of aware superheroes came in the form of Deadpool, who is nominally connected to a larger film universe that is part of the joke, and Kick-Ass, a punk indie comic bellowing from the outside. The center of the films awareness is primarily focused through Freddy Freeman, a literal in world superhero fanboy dressed in a variety of actual DCEU t-shirts. How Shazam! asserts its own awareness is quickly becoming a thorn in my side, as it verbally calls out tropes and conventions. Verbally calling attention to itself isn’t nearly as funny, effective, or clever as the film seems to think. All it does is name something, not actually deal with the trope and transform it with comedy. I blame Scream for this kind of awareness, I’m sure historically there was a predecessor but it is what first springs to mind. When Shazam! isn’t patting itself on the back for pointing out Dr. Sivanna is a supervillain, and instead deals in the visual language of superhero films it plays like gangbusters.

Mark Strong has penchant for taking on villainous roles, but the actor never seems to get out of second gear as Dr. Sivanna making things come off as fine, if generic. Sivanna in the film isn’t underdeveloped, he’s given the right amount of mirrored thematic cohesion to Billy and an able antagonist. It is just a role that ultimately doesn’t ask much of Strong, who spends most of his time walking around coolly in a sweet pair of aviators as Evil Grant Morrison. It is nice to see one of these movies finally get one right after a series of underdeveloped ones.

If there is one let down in regards to the antagonists of the piece it is how Sandberg and the design team translate the Seven Deadly Sins to the big screen. They are inspired by their New52 incarnations and look like you’d expect when drawing from that source, but the decision to not give each sin a single dominant color as in the comics visually dulls and confuses these personifications of sin. In an all around brightly lit and colorful film, the bland greyish green monsters fail to visually stand out from one another and when the action gets rolling. Sandberg and the cinematography team have a couple of nice moments and sequences, but the action is largely competently uninteresting. Sandberg does show a good ability to get a lot out of a little in this film.

There are some interesting elements to Shazam! that should give it some legs on home release. The evolving treatment of the superheroic figure in society is pretty much the only consistent element in the ever reactive DCEU. Zack Snyder treated them as these New Gods that challenged and failed to be understood by postmodern society. Patty Jenkins and James Wan treated their respective heroes as if they were folk heroes. With Shazam! the figure of the superhero has gone fully commercial and understood in the way modern commercial fandom is. Sandberg looking at Shazam through the lens of our modern viral celebrity culture is an interesting twist. Shazam! also continues the genres continual articulation on ideas of manhood that are never as developed in the film as you’d like.

Overall, Shazam! is a likable film and easy to watch. It manages to land the character and emotional beats in the moment with an ok script and stellar casting. On retrospect I wonder if they will hold up as well on subsoquent views. The writing is infinitely tighter than Aquaman, even if it lacks the sheer spectacle to make up for it as it strays now and then. Without this cast or Sandberg and Maxime Alexandre borrowing from the visual work of Spielberg and Richard Donner things wouldn’t have been nearly as entertaining. It isn’t an immediate all time great, but easily has me waiting and willing to see what Sandberg could do now that the table is set and with more money.