The Crow gets a bloody and gruesome reboot that’s stylized with goth flair but woefully lacking in every other category that made the original such a revered classic. The always compelling Bill Skarsgård outshines his co-star FKA Twigs in an obvious way that guts the plot’s central premise. They both look as expected in dyed, pierced, and tattooed chic. The problem is their weak chemistry in a sluggish script that’s light on character development and heavy on overblown theatrics. The pacing tests your patience as an already familiar narrative takes forever to develop.
The franchise’s fifth feature defangs the brutal initial crime that spurs a supernatural awakening. Demonic roots are planted with a breezy introduction of a forgettable villain who’s never that threatening. The opening has Shelly (Twigs), a talented pianist with a mysterious past, already in hiding. She gets a frantic call from a friend with evidence of crime lord/classical music enthusiast Vincent Roeg’s true abilities. A terrified Shelly realizes that she and Eric (Skarsgård) must once again go on the run.
True Love Shattered
1.5/5
Bill Skarsgård takes on the iconic role of THE CROW in this modern reimagining of the original graphic novel by James O’Barr. Soulmates Eric (Skarsgård) and Shelly (FKA twigs) are brutally murdered when the demons of her dark past catch up with them. Given the chance to save his true love by sacrificing himself, Eric sets out to seek merciless revenge on their killers, traversing the worlds of the living and the dead to put the wrong things right.
Release Date August 23, 2024
Distributor(s) Lionsgate
Pros
- Skarsgård is a great actor and does his best, and the great costume design helps a lot.
Cons
- FKA Twigs is a great singer but a horrible actor who tanks the emotional scenes of the movie.
- This Crow is painfully slow and you wish it would just get to the point. And then the ending is terribly lame.
Some time after their initial escape, Eric and Shelly live together in passionate bliss. She writes music to his haunting poetry. But their dreams are violently cut short when Roeg’s minions find them. Eric wakes up in a strange purgatory surrounded by black crows and a surreal mentor (Sami Bouajila). He’s despondent to learn that Shelly’s soul has been damned for eternity. But his pure, undying love for her has given him a chance to right the wrong that claimed both of their lives.
Skarsgård has an innate gravitas and physical stature that’s able to dominate the screen despite little or no dialogue. Anyone who’s seen It or Boy Kills World knows what he can emote with a stare. Skarsgård is believable playing Eric as shy and reserved.
Shelly has an outgoing personality that’s burdened with shame and regret, but Twigs just doesn’t have the acting ability to play the part with such limited exposition. The palpable magnetism that’s supposed to be easily recognizable between them feels one-sided. You can sense it from Skarsgård, but Twigs doesn’t have nearly his acting talent (you should hear her music, though). That gap rings hollow as Eric’s hellbent quest for vengeance takes shape.
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Molasses for the First Half, Blood for the Second
The Crow’s first hour is painfully slow. The script by Zach Baylin (the Oscar-nominated writer of King Richard and Bob Marley: One Love is an odd choice) and William Schneider (Return to Silent Hill), dwells and plods when it should have been humming along. Director Rupert Sanders (Snow White and the Huntsman, the whitewashed Ghost in the Shell) clearly understood this and tries to break up the monotony with montages sprinkled like pepper over a bland soup.
Alas, scenes of Eric and Shelly dancing, goofing off, and being intimate don’t liven the molasses-slow first act. Sanders should have trimmed the beginning for a leaner edit. The audience already knows why Eric and Shelly are being pursued, and Roeg’s evil intent, but it’s a snail’s pace to real action and carnage.
A river of blood, guts, and hacked limbs flows once the savagery spigot’s opened. This is the most violent film in the franchise by a country mile. Stomachs will churn as Eric pushes his intestines back inside gaping wounds, snapped limbs fuse together, and skulls are cracked open like brain candy. Eric’s the proverbial bull in the china shop once his rage is unleashed. The fight choreography has slicing and dicing in spades, but its execution is blunt. This actually makes sense, as Eric isn’t a trained killer. Gore fans are going to rejoice while action junkies may find the extreme violence unimaginative.
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2024’s The Crow Makes for Cool Cosplay and a Bad Movie
The goth cosplay crowd will get their money’s worth from the makeup and costume design. A trench coat-clad Eric walking in the rain with black paint dripping down his face and onto his sinewy muscles definitely nails the look. But this isn’t a Halloween contest for best Crow costume. There needed to be a much better film built around the character. It’s especially damning because Skarsgård makes every weak point better in vain. This film would have been an utter disaster with a lesser actor in the lead.
The Crow can be viewed in two ways and still reach the same lame conclusion. Forget any comparison to the original. Judge this film on its own merits. That said, it’s still a poor adaptation of James O’Barr’s comics. Fans who compare it to Brandon Lee (RIP) and Alex Proyas‘ 1994 masterpiece will be very disappointed. It’s not remotely a feather on that bird. As for where it stands against the other three terrible incarnations, that’s a discussion this reviewer gladly opts out of.
The Crow is a production of Edward R. Pressman Film, Davis Films, The Electric Shadow Company, and Ashland Hill Media Finance, et al. It will be released theatrically on August 23rd from Lionsgate.
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