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The Fantastic Four
When dosed with cosmic rays, four intrepid astronauts are given incredible powers. They decide to form a superhero group called the Fantastic Four to fight their arch-enemy, Dr. Doom.
Release : | 1994 |
Rating : | 3.8 |
Studio : | Constantin Film, New Horizons, |
Crew : | Art Direction, Production Design, |
Cast : | Alex Hyde-White Rebecca Staab Jay Underwood Michael Bailey Smith Carl Ciarfalio |
Genre : | Adventure Action Science Fiction |
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Reviews
Best movie of this year hands down!
Thanks for the memories!
Very interesting film. Was caught on the premise when seeing the trailer but unsure as to what the outcome would be for the showing. As it turns out, it was a very good film.
A film with more than the usual spoiler issues. Talking about it in any detail feels akin to handing you a gift-wrapped present and saying, "I hope you like it -- It's a thriller about a diabolical secret experiment."
Studio that held rights for FF was facing risk to lose them because they didn't make a movie for too long. They decided to avoid that risk by making low budget movie that will never be released. It was cheaper to waste one million dollars on "false" movie than to lose FF rights. This terribly underrated gem was made and luckily it saw light of the day, at least on internet. Movie is really cheap, but it's more than satisfying for such low budget, and if you are able to accept lousy effects you will have lots of fun. I really enjoyed it.7/10
While I am not particularly a fan of superhero films, I decided to see this after I saw the documentary about this picture, "Doomed: The Untold Story of Roger Corman's the Fantastic Four". This film has gained legendary status, as it was completed...yet never officially released in any way. So how did I get to see it? Somehow a bootleg copy escaped and the film has been sold at comic book festivals. There also is currently a copy on YouTube...though if Twentieth Century-Fox wanted to, they could enforce their copyright and have it removed. So far...they've allowed it to stay posted.Before I get to the review, I want to put this very low budget film in context. While technically speaking it looks like crap compared to superhero films today, back in the early 1990s superhero films were NOT the technical marvels they are today. Part of it is because CGI has grown by leaps and bounds since then. Part of it is that superhero films to that time (with the exception of "Batman" from 1989) looked really cheap and crappy. And, part of it is because the film only cost $1,000,000 to make...a pittance even back then. In this light, it's actually amazing that the film looks as good as it does! But be prepared...some of the special effects are far from being special!!Here's the story in a nutshell. Some scientists create a space craft but its diamond cluster drive (?) is sabotaged and it causes the ship to crash. Somehow this crash causes the four astronauts to become the Fantastic Four and imbued them with superhero powers. Following this, the baddie who caused the wreck, Dr. Doom, tries his best to kill the Four.Style-wise, this is much more like a comic book or kids film than the next generation of superhero pictures. It's far less serious and slight. This simply is how most such films at that time were made. Now I am not saying this is a great thing...but it's hard to expect a cheap film to somehow recreate the genre. Overall, it's watchable and entertaining...albeit a bit silly and slight as well. I cut this one a lot of slack for what it is...and I hope you do as well.By the way, this film was shelved in a deal that gave the rights to the franchise to Twentieth Century-Fox. And, since that studio did NOT want two "Fantastic Four" films, they chose to shelve this cheap Roger Corman film. Incidentally, the Fox film cost about 100 times more...and reviews for that film are generally terrible! So, even if the Corman film isn't great, at least it wasn't that much worse and cost practically nothing!!
The Fantastic Four (1994) * 1/2 (out of 4) Early Marvel adaptation about a group of astronauts who are struck with cosmic rays, which turns them into the title characters. Pretty soon the superheroes have to battle Dr. Doom.THE FANTASTIC FOUR has become quite the legendary picture because Roger Corman basically agreed to make it but then the film was never released. There are countless documents out there about why the movie was never released but it would be best for you to watch the recent documentary DOOMED: THE UNTOLD STORY OF ROGER CORMAN'S THE FINAL FOUR. That documentary features interviews with the cast and crew and really gives one a great understanding of what happened with this film.Obvously, having now seen this version, the biggest problem is that they were trying to make a high-budget movie with a very small budget. Whenever you do that it's going to be obvious when things are hampered because of the lack of money. This here really comes across as a bunch of people getting together without the means of making a high-budget movie and they just do whatever it takes to get the job done. The problem is that the entire cheap look just makes the film seem more silly than anything else. It's almost like a made up movie so to speak. Having seen the documentary and knowing what happened, I really feel bad for the cast and crew.I'm really not sure who would enjoy this movie on its own terms. The history behind the film has made it a cult item and on that level it is slightly entertaining to watch. If you're familiar with what happened behind-the-scenes then it's interesting to watch everything play out in front of your eyes. The only problem is that it's just not entertaining or silly enough to work as camp.
In light of what's come since, this low budget effort is absolutely brilliant by virtue of a single virtue: it's true to the SPIRIT of the comic book, something that not one of the three subsequent Big Budget knockoffs managed to achieve. Had THESE guys had the kind of money the lesser filmmakers had, we'd no doubt be talking Classic. (This version boasts by FAR the best Ben Grimm we've seen to date, and the articulation of his mask alone makes it worth seeing.) The first 30 minutes or so could've benefited from some reworking, but, otherwise, this one's the one to see if you want to see THE FANTASTIC FOUR. (Many scenes are shot in semi-darkness, for obvious- budgetary- reasons, but, again, these guys weren't working with hundreds of millions of dollars.) It's not all smooth sailing, to be sure, but until somebody comes along with something better, this one'll do.