The Crow (2024)

 

I'm probably one of the few true movie buffs who has not seen Brandon Lee's The Crow (1994), so I can't comment on similarities / differences between Lee's original, which was directed by Alex Proyas, and Bill Skarsgard's version, directed by Rupert Sanders.

Critics have not been impressed by Crow '24's storyline or the under-energized performances by Skarsgard, tatted musician Eric, and co-star British singer / actress FKA twigs, as Shelly. Watching two impossibly attractive people's slithering courtship is not enough to compel interest in an undercooked story about, well, it's hard for me to say. 

Film veteran Danny Huston plays Vincent Roeg, a tech villain with an ominous power of suggestion -- not sure how he came to have it -- who in in an unholy alliance with Shelly's mother, played by celebrated British stage actress Josette Simon, and other mysterious folk. The script does not explore comprehensibly any of this satisfactorily, but it all ends with the murder of one of Shelly's friends by Roe's agents and an attack on her and Eric as they try to avoid capture. 

The lovers are killed, and Eric finds himself in a mucky limbo with another of the undead, Kronos (Sami Bouajila), who tells him his love for Shelly will keep him suspended between life and death until her murder can be avenged. (It is quite likely all of this made more sense 30 years ago.)

I agree with those who say the first two acts of the film -- the courtship and the after-death revelation -- are a moody, atmospheric slog -- and the third act is where the real party is. But by then interest has passed and despite some pretty artful swordplay by Skarsgard and an astounding John Wickian body count in the halls of an opera house, the movie is DOA.

Requiescat in pace