Hancock (2008)

"Hancock" starts on the right track, only to go wayward soon enough. The main problem is that, although the subject is original and clever,the story-line is messy and linear, and the intended twists, forced and predictable.Maybe the worst mistake is that of approaching AGAIN the old trick of the "historic perspective": the super-heroes belong to an immortal and all-powerful race, the so-called "Gods" in mythology, bla-bla! We already saw it in so many movies - and, as a rule, totally compromised! As if this wasn't enough, they add up another time-spoiled motive: "love with the price of immortality".
These poor attempts to give "depth" to the story simply don't add-up with the starting context, which is very snappy and funny indeed: the "disabused" hero, fallen into alcoholism and neglect, and his love-hatred relationship with society. If I'd been the writers, I'd have stuck with the first option, which had many unexplored opportunities for comedy. Instead they try to make Hancock more 'meaningful' by introducing Charlize Theron as his female opposite number, and then explore a 'can't live with her, can't live without her' theme which seems to suggest that our superheroes are some kind of fundamental particles of opposite charge which cancel each other out and die when they are in close proximity.
Theron's super heroine has dealt with the loneliness of the long distance super hero by doing what any good girly does in the circumstances; finding a nice safe man (Ray) and helping him chose diapers. A so much more valuable use of her time than, say, rounding up drug cartels or refreezing the melting polar ice caps. Ahhhh! The satisfaction of domestic bliss! All humour is gone by the end and for the finale there's a spectacular and bloody gun battle in a hospital before the baddies get their come-uppance which I guess is what we really need from a super hero movie.
2.5/5