Review: John Carter

The first of the American blockbusters to hit this year sets a high standard for the (predominantly superhero-focused) event movies to follow.

Despite the ambivalent, surprisingly hype-free build up to the movie, it proves a winning mixture of grand adventure and otherworldly awesomeness, all presented within an impressively epic scope.

Although it’s based on a legendary novel that Hollywood has been attempting to adapt for seventy years, John Carter feels fresher than most contemporary blockbusters. The lack of multimedia familiarity with the characters and story benefits the film to no end. The inspiration for successes like Star Wars and Avatar is not difficult to discern within John Carter, and it lent the film a classic quality I greatly appreciated.

The design of the film is awesome – from the giant albino apes, glittering cities and flying machines to the more or less flawless green-skinned, twelve-foot-tall Tharks – everything popped nicely for me on a visual level.

All too often, films of this scope feel like all their edges have been ground down in the name of reaching the broadest possible audience. I got a sense while watching John Carter that the vision of director Andrew Stanton (WALL-E) was being delivered without compromise. There is a tangible throughline that proves all too rare in films of this size.

The film skews a little young at times, but never so much as to put me off. If you can allow yourself to be carried along by this fantastical story, the rewards are rich.