Of all of the craven, deceptive teases in Batman vs. Superman: Dawn of Justice, none is perhaps more flagrant than the film’s title. The two barrel-chested superheroes may face off in the movie’s grimacing poster, but they’re pitted against each other for all of five minutes of Zach Snyder’s two-and-a-half hours of pandering claptrap.
There are more fireworks in an early cocktail-party tête-à-tête between their alter egos, Bruce Wayne and Clark Kent (Ben Affleck and Henry Cavill) than in their brief caped confrontation, but, like every human-interest inroad into this hulking monstrosity, it is short-lived. Verbal proficiency, alas, is not this movie’s strong suit: In a film that will earn most of its profit on the international market, screenwriters Chris Terrio and David S. Goyer were hired to create the filler between the explosions, and the movie’s final 45 minutes contain almost no dialogue, no humanity, no story.
Ditto the film’s discombobulated, music-video-style prologue, a digitally fetishized and superfluous rehash of the slaughter of Bruce Wayne’s parents (sorry to sound so callous, but dude, get over it) operatically merging into an apocalypse already in progress: Metropolis is under siege by alien craft that soullessly topple skyscrapers, destroying everything except for Affleck’s flawlessly gelled hair. There is little letup in this perpetual Armageddon. Panel by panel, Batman v. Superman is a bludgeoning, torturous example of sound and fury signifying nothing, out-Transforming even the Transformers franchise in its excessive vacuity.
Would that the film have acknowledged its inherent soullessness with the slightest wink or nod. No, this infantile excuse for action figures and Happy Meal tie-ins thinks it’s clever, which is all the more insulting. It’s calculated to reflect a cynical zeitgeist in which yesterday’s superheroes are today’s lawless pariahs —chips bargained in political brinksmanship. Superman’s invincibility and Batman’s vigilantism are scorned rather than admired, and in a scene that falls woefully short of its premise, the Man of Steel is even called to testify before Congress by a crusading senator (Holly Hunter) for his role in a bloody standoff in Africa.
We’ve literally seen this movie before. The Christopher Nolan Batman trilogy, The Amazing Spider-Man 2 and Avengers: Age of Ultron were defined by an identical sense of hero malaise. Snyder’s latest comment on our polarized powder-keg landscape feels late to the party.
A handful of the supporting players, at least, seem to be having a good time, including Laurence Fishburne as Daily Planet editor Perry White, effectively conjuring the old-school newshound comic-relief of Jackie Cooper in the 1978 Superman, and Jeremy Irons, replacing the indefatigable Michael Caine as Bruce Wayne’s sardonic, meddling butler Alfred.
But it’s really Jesse Eisenberg’s movie. The brainy character actor redefines Lex Luthor as a floppy-haired, twitchy biotech geek with a penchant for Jolly Ranchers and existential destruction. His every scene is an infectious hoot, the latest in an ongoing series of comic-book villains upstaging the title characters.
The same cannot be said for Affleck’s soporific entrée as Bruce Wayne/Batman, a charmless fount of perpetual grimness who, when not growling under Bat ears, tends to blend into the wallpaper — but I guess we can’t all be Robert Downey Jr. And poor Gal Gadot, the Israeli model-actress debuting as Wonder Woman, barely registers amid the relentless CGI noise, thanks to a script that short-shrifts her backstory and personality.
The rest of the plot is an incoherent jumble involving Russian evildoers, weaponized kryptonium and CIA secrets, a goulash of nonsense meant to justify the core inconsequence of the entire venture. The Batmobile drives through an ocean liner; Superman battles a sludge monster in outer space; the denouement laboriously teases conflicts in D.C.’s future monumental widgets. “This is about the future of the world,” Batman asserts, with stump-speech gravitas. Yeah, but isn’t it always?
BATMAN VS. SUPERMAN: DAWN OF JUSTICE. Director: Zach Snyder; Cast: Henry Cavill, Ben Affleck, Amy Adams, Jesse Eisenberg, Diane Lane, Laurence Fishburne, Jeremy Irons, Holly Hunter, Gal Gadot, Kevin Costner; Distributor: Warner; Rating: PG-13; Opens: Friday at most area theaters