Zack Snyder’s Justice League
It honestly should not have taken this long for Warner Bros. to give Zack Snyder an opportunity to go back to finish his vision of the first team-up of “Justice League.” This is a studio that made two different versions of an “Exorcist” prequel that nobody asked for, and ended up releasing both within a year of each other. I’m not here to relitigate the journey that finally brought us “Zack Snyder’s Justice League,” but to share my thoughts now that we finally have it.
2017’s “Justice League” was the work of Joss Whedon finishing, and retooling, a film Snyder was unable to after the tragic death of his daughter, Autumn, whom Snyder has dedicated this version to. (Yes, I’m aware there was more behind-the-scenes than that; again, I’m not interested in relitigating the journey to this version.) Getting Whedon to finish a Snyder film is like getting Renny Harlin to rework a film by Paul Schrader, to bring up “Exorcist: The Beginning” again- you’re going to get two completely different films. Part of the reason “Justice League ’17” doesn’t work is because, as a continuation of the world that Snyder built in “Man of Steel” and “Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice,” and Patty Jenkins expanded in “Wonder Woman,” it doesn’t feel like it belongs. It feels like the work of a filmmaker best known for blending humor and action, not one whose signature style is akin to cinematic opera. As a standalone film, that one is serviceable, but with Snyder’s vision for the film realized, there’s no need to watch it again, except as a curiosity for future film students to see how editing, reshoots, and different sensibilities can turn a film into something radically different.
Snyder’s epic film begins with the death of Superman, and seeing how it reverberates (quite literally) around the world- it’s his death cry that awakens the Mother Box held by the Amazonians, which will bring Steppenwolf to Earth to locate the three Mother Boxes needed to form the Unity, and destroy Earth. The world tries to move on without Superman, but Bruce Wayne (Ben Affleck) feels the need to bring together a group of heroes anyway, with the sense that they will be needed with Superman (Henry Cavill) gone. When Steppenwolf (Ciarán Hinds) retrieves the first box from Themyscira and the Amazonians, Diana Prince (Gal Gadot) sounds the alarm, and they begin to bring the team together.
I’m leaving the plot synopsis fairly bare because, if you watched the 2017 film, this one follows along the same script, devised by Snyder, Will Beall and screenwriter Chris Terrio. It’s the moments and storytelling beats that Snyder reinstates, or fleshes out, that take this film from its barely 2-hour running time in 2017 to 4 hours now. I feel like the film could have been massaged a bit more in editing to keep the pacing from feeling halting and erratic, but Snyder breaking up the story in six chapters (with an epilogue) doesn’t help that, either. This is not to say I think much of anything should be excised completely from “Zack Snyder’s Justice League,” though; his incessant usage of slow-motion (which has always bothered me) doesn’t help matters. Watching the film, I was reminded of his Ultimate Cut of “Watchmen,” which brings more of Alan Moore’s seminal book to the screen, but bogs down the pacing completely; I wish it was more like either the original version of Peter Jackson’s “King Kong,” which tells the same story as the 1933 film, but also manages to add over 90 minutes which doesn’t weigh down the spectacle and adventure as much as one would expect. By adding the chapter title cards, I feel like Snyder is giving himself an “out” to just say “screw pacing” more than finding the smoothest way to tell this story.
One of my favorite parts of the 2017 film was what we got of Victor Stone, aka Cyborg. After he and his mother were in a deadly car crash after a football game, Victor’s father, Silas (Joe Morton)- a scientist working with one of the Mother Boxes at the site of the Kryptonian ship in Metropolis- gives Victor new life as a part man, part machine Frankenstein’s monster, alone in the world until Diana Prince looks for him in trying to bring the team together. I really liked the work by Ray Fisher, whose voice shined a light on some of the worst behind-the-scenes stories of the reshoots, and honestly, the expansion of his role in the story was what had me most excited for Snyder’s epic film. I was not disappointed, and we feel the loneliness in the character, as well as his determination to do right by people, in a way missing in the 2017 film, as well as Morton’s expanded role in the story. He doesn’t feel like a perfunctory addition to the team but someone with a key role to play, and I think this is what the additional material brings to “Zack Snyder’s Justice League”- the sense that everyone on this team not only has a part to play, but a story to tell. Getting to know more of Victor Stone’s was reason enough for this to exist.
The next character to get an increased storyline is Barry Allen (Ezra Miller). We still see him go to visit his father in prison, but we also see a moment where he saves a young woman from a crash. A lot of his character is the same, but we see the struggle in him as he wants to help his father, while his father wants him to become his own man. It comes to a head during the final sequence, which has much stronger stakes not just because of the depth in the story, but how deftly the villain Darkseid is woven into the film. Every central character is given more room to breathe, and have a story in this film, and because of the casting of the roles, we follow each and every one.
The cinematography by Fabian Wagner, seen in 4:3 aspect ratio to approximate IMAX framing, is beautifully composed, and I will not lie, if given a chance to see it in IMAX, I would. The score by Junkie XL (Thomas Holkenborg) cannot quite reach the heights of Hans Zimmer’s work for Snyder’s previous DC movies, but the emotional pull is there when the established themes are brought out. There’s a different scene between Lois Lane (Amy Adams) and Martha Kent (Diane Lane) that really captures the emotions these characters are going through- unfortunately, it’s undercut by a character reveal that would have best been left for the end during one of the film’s “epilogue” scenes. I still don’t think the film works as well as “Man of Steel,” which is one of Snyder’s best films as a director, but now that “Zack Snyder’s Justice League” is available to watch, it’s obvious that he had a unique vision for these films that he followed through with until the end. I haven’t been this excited to see what he does next ever. May’s “Army of the Dead” will hopefully prove a worthy follow-up.
In this Snyder Cut all the questions that the Theatrical Cut did not give are answered, digging into the background of the characters and giving valid reasons where it seemed everything was thrown into turmoil and even randomly placed; moreover, the full potential of Snyder’s direction is expressed through his unique and particular shots, also implementing and improving both CGI and cinematography, which are the perfect accompaniment to the director’s vision. The four hours of the Snyder Cut with i find out on PortalulTauTV.net , are nothing more than a blaze of beauty towards these heroes, where with the old release seemed all too strange that they (production & co.) had offered so little from such a talented and resourceful director.