Movie Review: 'Green Lantern' shines

"Green Lantern," the current DC Comic ripoff now playing at the Fandango Galaxy cineflex in Carson City, is all about a corps of Green Lantern good guys who protected the universe from evildoers such as Parallax, the baddest bad guy around.

Movie starts with Temuera Morrison as Abin Sur getting hit by Parallax while sledding through space and crashing on a rocky beach. With his dying breath he send his powerful Green Lantern out to find someone to replace him in guarding Earth from Parallax.

His replacement if Hal Jordan (Ryan Reynolds), a test pilot with an independence streak that get him fired after he screwed up a demo of q new fighter plane.

Enter Peter Sarsgaard as Dr. Hector Hammond, a friend of Jordan's who performs an autopsy of the dead Abin Sur and is infected with a sliver of Parallax's bad stuff and becomes a bloated bad guy who tries to kill his father (takes him two attempts.)

There's a love interest, Blake Lively as Carol Ferris, Jordan's chief squeeze and a fellow test pilot.

The plot takes Jordan to Green Lantern HQ planet Oa where he is inducted into the Corps and given training. Then back to Earth to spin out the movie with special effects (which no longer have the power to awe even in the 3-D version).

Final battle has Jordan and Parallax slugging it out. No need to tell you who wins.

This is the latest DC comics hero translated to the screen, and while there is a lot of foolishness and with a fighter jet sequence that is excellent, most of it all is rather pedestrian and "I've seen this before." Still, for the youth crowd which powers movies these days (Seniors: when was the last time you went to the movies? Blame yourself for the comic book stuff.) it should draw well. Surveys show the audiences liked it even if the critics didn't.

Me, I didn't bite nails or eat popcorn but stayed for the whole thing.
--- Sam Bauman

CAST
Hal Jordan:Ryan Reynolds A former captain of the United States Air Force and test pilot for the Ferris Aircraft who becomes a Green Lantern and the first Earthman ever inducted into the Green Lantern Corps.[ Reynolds said, "I've known about 'Green Lantern' my whole life, but I've never really followed it before. I fell in love with the character when I met with Martin Campbell".Reynolds called the film "an origin story to a certain degree, but it's not a labored origin story, where the movie begins in the third act. The movie starts when it starts. We find out Hal is the guy fairly early on, and the adventure begins". Alternatively Chris Pine and Sam Worthington had been in discussions for the role. Bradley Cooper, Jared Leto and Justin Timberlake were other top contenders,[while Brian Austin Green, a Green Lantern fan, campaigned for the part, but ultimately did not audition.

Blake Lively as Carol Ferris:
The vice president of Ferris Aircraft and a long-time love interest of Hal Jordan. One pseudonymous writer citing unnamed sources said Lively was among five leading contenders that included Eva Green, Keri Russell, Diane Kruger and Jennifer Garner.[13] About her stunt work in which she rehearsed with stunt coordinator Gary Powell (Casino Royale, The Bourne Ultimatum, Quantum of Solace), gymnastic acrobats from Cirque du Soleil and used aerial stunt rigs created for The Matrix, Lively explained, "Our director likes it real—the fights close and dirty... I'm 40 feet in the air, spiraling around. That's the best workout you can ever do because it's all core... You do that for ten minutes and you should see your body the next day! It's so exhilarating, so thrilling—and nauseating".

Peter Sarsgaard as Dr. Hector Hammond:
A scientist who discovers the fragments of a strange meteor that causes his brain to grow to enormous size, granting him psionic powers. Regarding his preparation for the role, Sarsgaard stated, "I actually did hang with this biologist from Tulane that was I think just the most eccentric guy they could find. He was entertaining, and he and I actually worked on my lecture that I give in [Green Lantern], which I kept royally f---ing up." About his character Sarsgaard remarked, "He's got shades of gray. It's eccentricity on top of eccentricity".

Mark Strong as Thaal Sinestro:
A Green Lantern and Hal Jordan's mentor.[17] Strong affirmed that the film will follow the origin story, "the film closely follows the early comics. Sinestro starts out as Hal Jordan’s mentor, slightly suspicious and not sure of him because obviously Hal is the first human being who’s made into a Green Lantern. He's certainly very strict and certainly unsure of the wisdom of Hal becoming a Green Lantern". Strong said the character "is a military guy but isn't immediately bad. It's the kind of person he is that lends himself to becoming bad over the course of the comics being written, but initially he’s quite a heroic figure.” He also revealed that the outfit and other aspects of the character very closely follow the character's early days, “That widow's peak and thin mustache was for some reason originally based on David Niven.... So I would like to do justice to the Sinestro that was conceived for the comic books”.

Angela Bassett as Dr. Amanda Waller:
A former congressional aide and government agent.[19] About the differences between the comic book and film character Bassett said, "Well, I’m not 300 pounds," but added that her character does have "that intellectual, that bright, that no-nonsense, that means business [personality]. [She's] getting it done and in the trenches nothing fazes her".

Tim Robbins as U.S. senator Robert Hammond:
The disapproving father of the movie's villain, Hector Hammond.

Temuera Morrison as Abin Sur:
A Green Lantern who crash lands on Earth and recruits Hal Jordan as his replacement.[22] Morrison said it took four to five hours to put on the prosthetic makeup for the character. About filming with Ryan Reynolds, Morrison commented, "We did the whole scene together where I give him the ring, our suits are CGI so we had these grey suits with things on them so it was cool and working with Martin Campbell again was great too".

Taika Waititi as Thomas Kalmaku:
An Inuit engineer at Ferris Aircraft. Waititi said he was cast after a Warner Bros. casting agent saw his performance in Boy, which he also wrote and directed. Waititi – who has a Jewish mother and Maori father[ – says the production "had an opening for a role in the film for someone who wasn't, I don't [know], not-white or not-black."

Geoffrey Rush as the voice of Tomar-Re:
A bird-beaked member of the Green Lantern Corps who teaches Hal Jordan how to use his cosmic powers.[26] Rush stated he was not initially familiar with Green Lantern but was drawn to the part after seeing the concept art explaining, "When I got the offer for it I said, ‘Haven’t they made that film?’ They said, ‘No, it’s a completely computer-generated character.’ I saw the artwork and I said, I would love to be that guy. Because I had voiced an owl in Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga'Hoole and I’d voiced a pelican in Finding Nemo and I thought I could really improve on that now by being half-bird, half-fish, part lizard. You don’t get to do that in a live-action film." Rush compared the role to previous roles where he played a mentoring figure, "You could say that I’ve mentored Queen Elizabeth I as [Sir Francis] Walsingham, and [Leon] Trotsky has mentored Frida Kahlo and now Tomar Re is going to mentor Hal Jordan, and I was sort of mentoring King George VI in The King's Speech. But I can’t imagine Tomar Re setting up an office on Harley Street in London. They’re all very different people to me, but there is a kind of theme I suppose".
• Michael Clarke Duncan as the voice of Kilowog:
A drill sergeant trainer of new recruits for the Green Lantern Corps.[28] About the character, Duncan, a fan of the comic book, stated, "He's a real type of tough guy who knows everything, and actually in one of the comic books he and Superman fought to a tie".

Clancy Brown as the voice of Parallax:
A former Guardian of the Universe, who was imprisoned by Abin Sur after he was exposed to the yellow energy of fear.

Additionally, Jon Tenney plays Martin Jordan, Hal Jordan's father. Jay O. Sanders portrays Carl Ferris, an aircraft designer and father of Carol Ferris and Mike Doyle is cast as Jack Jordan, Hal Jordan's older brother.[30][31][32]

Directed by Martin Campbell
Produced by Donald De Line
Greg Berlanti
Screenplay by Greg Berlanti
Michael Green
Marc Guggenheim
Michael Goldenberg
Story by Greg Berlanti
Michael Green
Marc Guggenheim

Based on Based upon characters appearing in comic books published by DC Comics
Tim Robbins Music by James Newton Howard Cinematography Dion Beebe Editing by Stuart Baird Studio DC Entertainment
De Line Pictures Distributed by Warner Bros. Pictures Release date(s) June 17, 2011 Running time 114 minutes[1] Country United States Language English Budget $200 million[2] Gross revenue $52,685,000, rated pg-13