Reviews

Expected a lot from Farhan Akthar, but all that is here is a disappointing mess. A straight away remake without any major changes would have worked much better than this modified version. Just one year following this disaster, the Tamil remake sticking to the original plot was released with Ajith Kumar and that's a blockbuster. The only thing that I liked here is that Don survives at the end paving way for a sequel. All other changes are completely unnecessary and frustrating.

As for the cast, it's entirely SRK show. He is the Don. But the same can't be said for the others. Boman Irani successfully fails at being the antagonist. Priyanka looks like a rookie. Kareena - just for glamour show. Arjun - Useless and frustrating inclusion. But it's the writer's fault for giving them such baseless roles.

Shankar Ehsaan Loy's songs are mediocre except for the Don Theme. Don't know who the heck is the stunt director, but he should be kicked out. It's like every character here has been to Shaolin Temple for Martial arts training. It's a Gangster movie, not kung fu panda. Even then the action scenes were so dumb. There is more shouting than fighting. And Boman shouting like a strangled cat doesn't help.

Apart from SRK, his Louis Phillippe wardrobe by Akhil Nirula is noticeably good.

Watch Billa after watching this mess and u will realize how Farhan has wasted a great script and a Star actor.

Maybe it's high time that Tamil Cinema starts making genuine horror movies instead of these adulterated horror-comedies that don't work most of the time. I mean literally every tamil horror movie is actually a messed up Horror-comedy. Lift is just another addition to this long queue.

The film has an intriguing premise (Stuck in the Lift with a Ghost). But it has been completely wasted because we are too stubborn to let go off our traditional horror-comedy way infused with heroic moments.

The comedy here doesn't work as they are more of mocking the Toxic work culture which is a serious issue. And the forced Romance! Like the genre has not been diluted enough already. I don't know what woman develops feelings for a stranger who intentionally destroys her smartphone. I just hope such stupid immature women don't exist. But that's our heroine here.

Speaking of our main character, the Ghost (it's a horror movie, not a hero movie). Here is where the director was clean bowled. It could probably compete with our heroine for stupidity. Same old story - some bad people kill an innocent; innocent's ghost is now on a revenge mission and it accomplishes it single handedly. Actually it has completed the mission at the beginning of the film itself. The Protagonists (both hero and heroine) are not even related to this remotely. Nor do they aid in the Ghost's mission like in the Muni franchise. Maybe now the Ghost has nothing to do in it's freetime, it decided to get some company. Tormenting and haunting the Protagonists till the kill themselves. A ghost with a code, I guess. It wants to kill two kinds of people, a bad kind and an innocent kind. But doesn't want the innocent's blood on it's hands. That's got to be the most annoyingly stupid ghost character I've ever seen in a horror movie. On top of that, it's actually two ghosts, not one. Both being stupid.

The only decent character is our hero. Kavin does give a good performance. Especially the scene where he gets trapped alone in the Lift with the ghost. It's actually the only scene that's scary enough to watch in the whole film. And Kavin pulls it off superbly.

Other than that there's nothing good or scary here. Everytime something starts to happen, we expect a frightening one but the stupid ghosts end up pulling chairs and remote controlling the lift. Even kids can scare better. Plotholes, unnecessary characters, tonal inconsistencies etc. The film is a complete mess.

Some people say that the lift is actually a metaphor for toxic work culture. That it has been perfectly captured by the cinematographer. But the revelation that the film is about toxicity of corporate atmosphere happens too late. At the very end, that it has no impact at all except for these over-analysers trying to give a deeper meaning to the lift scenes which the director himself has terribly failed at showing visually.

In short, Kavin has got into a Lift that keeps going down and down, no matter how hard he tries to repair it.

I don't understand why can't WB make a proper origin story for Amazons and then a Wonder Woman film. Be it animated or Live action, they just chose to squeeze & compress a 2 hrs worthy origin story into a mere 5 mins introduction scene which absolutely has no impact and it does not give any explanation for why the Amazons have low to no regards for Male gender ( Not Mankind or Man's World, cuz the rest of the world also has Women, whom the writers of both this Animated one and the 2017 live action film failed to recognize just to play the blame game). Instead it's just frustrating that whenever the Amazons criticize the male gender, we have to assume something horrible has been done to them by Men but don't know what it is.

Speaking of the characters, don't know who wrote this versions of Ares and Trevor but they r both incredibly annoying & stupid. I've not read the comics, but Wikipedia has much better characterization for both of them. Here Trevor is more of a Playboy than a Military personal and Ares, even his army could scare people but he looks like an guy who regularly visits the gym. Not to mention his big mouth. Wondering if he is God of War or God of Talking. Makes a big talk and gets his asskicked. Neither of them have any depth.

What this two failed has been mildly compensated by Artemis and Alexa. Though they have little screentime compared to the above big mouths, they do make an impression. Can't say the same for Diana. A rather boring Protagonist. The film is fast paced and filled with a lot of plotholes too. Animation is okay. Unnecessary depiction of blood and violence though. Instead of being "Oh God, she decapitated him", its just "she decapitated him".

What's impressive in this film is the Background score by Christopher Drake. Honestly, the film does not deserve his score at all.

I don't understand the words 'mankind' and 'man's world'. As if the entire globe is full of men and women r only in Themyscira. Entire Amazons keep saying that Men are easily corruptible and do not deserve their help. Then who is Isabel Maru? A man disguised as woman? Right from the beginning, the Amazons are portrayed as blatant sexists. Here it's a woman who creates the most dangerous weapon and intends to use it to kill millions. But it doesn't matter. All that the Amazons want is to blame Men. Even if the crime is committed by a woman also, a man should be blamed. Perhaps humankind is the apt word and pretty sure that the Amazons are aware of such a word but still they will use mankind only. Don't know whether it's how they are written in the comics, but it's disgusting and stupid. I've not read any comics but have watched a lot of dc animated shows and films. But not in one have I found a proper origin story for Amazons. Every story seems stupid, and in every story the Amazons are stupid.

Here it's too cliched and baseless. The antagonist Ares is so underwritten that by the time he makes his appearance it doesn't have an impact. The dialogues are so dull and cliched.

There are a lot of plot holes.

A) Why was Hippolyta hiding the truth about Diana's birth from Diana? Because if Diana knows it, then Ares will find her soon. That's a dumb queen. Diana is going after Ares. The truth could actually help her.

B) Who is the Chief? He seems to be a well known character in the army but we don't know what he is.

C) Sameer can speak lots of language. But there was no use for it apart of showing off to Diana which ended in a miserable failure.

D) Charlie seems to be a marksman but never does he show his skills. Even Diana asks the same to which Sameer gives an unnecessary unrelated speech. Apparently Charlie is there just to sing. Are they going to War or picnic?

E) I don't know what's Diana's mission. Is it to kill Ares, Stop the war and save millions of people, women and children? Or is it just to kill Ares and stop the war? In No man's land She fights to save the women, Children and innocent people of Veld. But when she kills Ludendorff (whom she believed to be Ares) and the war doesn't end, she backs off. She is like "Oh Men are inherently corrupted by birth. Let them kill themselves and all the innocent people, women and children. I don't care." Spoken like a true Hero. And when Steve sacrifices himself to save millions, she suddenly has a change of heart. Looks like she backed off to save herself and let Steve do the sacrifice. She is strong enough to go hand to hand with Superman. She can withstand the Hydrogen bombs, but she won't do that. True noble warrior.

F) In the climax, Ares had the upper hand over Diana in the beginning. That makes sense, he is God of War. But Diana though referred to as a god, she is not actually a God. Yet she turns the table and kills Ares. How? Because she believes in LOVE. Probably the writers couldn't find any reason to how Diana could kill Ares, so chose to go the Love way. That's too cliched and stupid. To be specific, it's romantic love. Not mother's love or any other kind of love. It would be apt to call the Amazons and especially Diana as Hypocrites. Not noble warriors.

There are a lot other plotholes too. One could write a book with all of them.

In terms of casting, very poor. I don't know why a lot of people celebrated this film and Gadot. She looks like a Cosplayer dressed as wonder woman. She is neither an actor. She is a model who had some military training. Henry Cavill, Ben Affleck, Margot Robbie, Viola Davis - they are actors. Gadot is totally unfit for this role. Her action scenes where so dull. She is just stretching her legs and doing some gymnastics. Heard people praising her for doing this role while she was pregnant. Who asked her to do at the time? Take maternity leave, deliver the baby and return to work once she is back to form. Don't know how long do I have to brace myself and watch her being cast as Wonder Woman. No wonder why DC films can't compete with Marvel. One of the reasons for Marvel film's success is their casting. Like the Actors were born to play the character.

Moreover Captain America The First Avenger has a lot of similarities to Wonder Woman in terms of story and characters. Only stark difference is Captain America is a good film, while Wonder Woman is second worst in DC following Suicide Squad.

The only aspects that were commendable here are the cinematography and the background score. Otherwise this is a one-time watch film to be watched only for a continuity in Justice League story.

The idea is good. But on screen it's too slow to evoke any response. Honestly there's nothing here to scare at all. Even the demon itself seems stupid. It has telekinetic and telepathic abilities, it wants the Protagonist to die, but doesn't want to get the blood on it's hand. Spoiler - that so called demon is invisible till the end of the movie.

Lot of people kept praising Rebecca Hall's acting, but it's a horror movie at first. What's the use of an actor giving great performance when the movie is bland to a fault.