Doctor Strange A Spoiler Free Review
Nov. 2nd, 2016 10:14 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
puppetmakerI hope
The origin of Doctor Strange is usually a two page summery all through the comics. Egotistical Doctor, who has almost god-like surgical skills and knows it, gets into a car accident and, due to nerve damage, can no longer hold a scalpel. He spends his entire fortune and some trying to heal the damage. Broke he finds himself in the mystical east and meets the Ancient One who helps him to see more than he could. Through various trials and tribulations, he becomes the Master of the Mystic Arts.
How he gets there is the subject of the Doctor Strange film that is opening this Friday.
Doctor Strange is my favorite character in the Marvel pantheon and has been since I first read his origins story in Origins of Marvel Comics. When this film was announced, according to Peter, I squeed a bit. The first trailer had me vibrating with happiness. It felt right to me.
However the trailers are not the film and, recently, there have been trailers that have shown all the ‘good parts’ of a film and the rest is dreck. I had worries about how they were going to present the multiverse. Would Ditko’s trippy scenery be used at all? Where they going to go with the egomaniac who falls or soften him up and make him more cuddly from the beginning like they did in the TV movie from the 70s?
My basic request for this film is ‘’Please don’t suck”. I want people to come out of this film wanting to know more about the character.
Caroline was my test subject since she hasn’t read the comics and didn’t know the character well other than ‘mommy loves this character for some weird reason.’
She loved it so that’s a good sign for the general public being able to enjoy this film without too much information.
Overall it is the film I have wanted to see since I first read the comics. It does its source material proud and has some lovely in jokes for those of us who have been reading the comics for a very long time. It is one of the best origin stories I have seen.
Benedict Cumberbatch does very well as Stephen Strange. His accent slides around a bit but over all solid mid-western American. Tilda Swinton is amazing as the Ancient One. I knew she could do ethereal and other worldly well but she takes this to a whole new level. Chiwetel Ejiofor as Mordo is interesting but used more as a sidekick/mentor to give information to Strange and the audience as we go. I felt he was under utilized in the role and his role felt more like set up for the next film if there is one. Benedict Wong stole a number of scenes he was in and I loved how both the writers and he interpreted the character from the comics to the screen. Mads Mikkelson does very well with what he is given and you almost feel some sympathy for him and, given what his character does, that’s some good acting.
Sets and costumes are wonderful. Taking the costume that is in the comics as the basis for the film costume, Alexandra Byrne did an excellent job of creating the look of the characters. She created Caroline’s favorite character in the movie which is the Cloak of Levitation. Yes, it is a character. See the film and tell me it’s not, I dare ya.
This is one of the few films that, if you don’t get motion sick, I would recommend the 3-D version for some of the inter-dimensional scenes and a couple of the fights that take place in shifting reality.
Two thumbs way up and would/will see again.
I am grateful I was able to go to the Marvel screening.
The origin of Doctor Strange is usually a two page summery all through the comics. Egotistical Doctor, who has almost god-like surgical skills and knows it, gets into a car accident and, due to nerve damage, can no longer hold a scalpel. He spends his entire fortune and some trying to heal the damage. Broke he finds himself in the mystical east and meets the Ancient One who helps him to see more than he could. Through various trials and tribulations, he becomes the Master of the Mystic Arts.
How he gets there is the subject of the Doctor Strange film that is opening this Friday.
Doctor Strange is my favorite character in the Marvel pantheon and has been since I first read his origins story in Origins of Marvel Comics. When this film was announced, according to Peter, I squeed a bit. The first trailer had me vibrating with happiness. It felt right to me.
However the trailers are not the film and, recently, there have been trailers that have shown all the ‘good parts’ of a film and the rest is dreck. I had worries about how they were going to present the multiverse. Would Ditko’s trippy scenery be used at all? Where they going to go with the egomaniac who falls or soften him up and make him more cuddly from the beginning like they did in the TV movie from the 70s?
My basic request for this film is ‘’Please don’t suck”. I want people to come out of this film wanting to know more about the character.
Caroline was my test subject since she hasn’t read the comics and didn’t know the character well other than ‘mommy loves this character for some weird reason.’
She loved it so that’s a good sign for the general public being able to enjoy this film without too much information.
Overall it is the film I have wanted to see since I first read the comics. It does its source material proud and has some lovely in jokes for those of us who have been reading the comics for a very long time. It is one of the best origin stories I have seen.
Benedict Cumberbatch does very well as Stephen Strange. His accent slides around a bit but over all solid mid-western American. Tilda Swinton is amazing as the Ancient One. I knew she could do ethereal and other worldly well but she takes this to a whole new level. Chiwetel Ejiofor as Mordo is interesting but used more as a sidekick/mentor to give information to Strange and the audience as we go. I felt he was under utilized in the role and his role felt more like set up for the next film if there is one. Benedict Wong stole a number of scenes he was in and I loved how both the writers and he interpreted the character from the comics to the screen. Mads Mikkelson does very well with what he is given and you almost feel some sympathy for him and, given what his character does, that’s some good acting.
Sets and costumes are wonderful. Taking the costume that is in the comics as the basis for the film costume, Alexandra Byrne did an excellent job of creating the look of the characters. She created Caroline’s favorite character in the movie which is the Cloak of Levitation. Yes, it is a character. See the film and tell me it’s not, I dare ya.
This is one of the few films that, if you don’t get motion sick, I would recommend the 3-D version for some of the inter-dimensional scenes and a couple of the fights that take place in shifting reality.
Two thumbs way up and would/will see again.
I am grateful I was able to go to the Marvel screening.
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no subject
Date: 2016-11-02 02:57 pm (UTC)I hope I can see it soon.
no subject
Date: 2016-11-02 08:11 pm (UTC)wasn't a BC fan until...
Date: 2016-11-02 09:57 pm (UTC)Can't wait to be able to see this movie. No clue anything about the character, so will be fun.
Re: wasn't a BC fan until...
Date: 2016-11-03 01:30 am (UTC)I am going to see Hamlet in a movie theater later this month.
Re: wasn't a BC fan until...
Date: 2016-11-03 03:40 pm (UTC)