I will pretty much see any movie that has a superhero as a character at least once. I tend to enjoy those movies even when I have no prior knowledge about the characters. When I first saw a trailer for the movie Daredevil it was the first time I had ever heard of the character even though the comic had been out since the 1960's. I ended up seeing the movie once it was released on DVD.
Matt Murdock was blinded in a freak accident involving some kind of chemicals when he was a child. After the accident, his other senses became incredibly stronger and he even had some sort of radar type of sense that allowed him to sort of see. Matt’s father Jack was a boxer who was murdered after he refused to throw one of his fights. As an adult, Matt became a lawyer to try to find justice for victims of crimes. When things didn’t turn out in his favor in court, Matt took things into his own hands as Daredevil, a vigilante that dealt with criminals at night. He was very good at martial arts and his enhanced senses greatly helped him when he was acting as Daredevil.
One day Matt met Elektra Natchios, a young woman that was an expert at martial arts. Matt was drawn to her and pursued her even though she tried to give him the brush off at first. He developed very strong feelings for her quickly, but he still kept his identity as Daredevil a secret from her. As Daredevil, he was trying to stop the Kingpin, a man who ran all the crime in town. Elektra’s father Nikolas had ties to the Kingpin that put his life in danger when he decided to pull out. The Kingpin sent Bullseye, a deadly assassin, after Nikolas. Daredevil tried to protect Nikolas, but things went wrong and Elektra blamed Daredevil for what happened. She became obsessed with getting revenge for what had happened which put her on a course to face Daredevil since he was also trying to deal with Bullseye and the Kingpin.
Daredevil did take some time fairly early in the movie to share some back story for Matt. It was shared how Matt became blind and how he then went on to adapt to his enhanced senses. As an adult, Matt picked a career that he thought would allow him to help victims and he also fought crime on his own at night. When the movie started, Matt was already going around as Daredevil, so there wasn’t anything that showed how he came to the decision to dress up in red leather and call himself Daredevil to deal with criminals that the court system missed. I would have liked it if the movie had covered more of how Matt started off as Daredevil instead of jumping into things with that already established. I think it would have been easier for people with no prior knowledge of the character to follow the movie if those things had been explained. I never read any of the Daredevil comics, so I have no idea how much the characters were changed for the movie.
Daredevil was one of the darker superhero movies that I have seen because of the actual lighting in some scenes to the fact that revenge played a big role in the plot. Every superhero movie has had some kind of villain and fights between the hero and villain. Bullseye was one of the deadlier villains for this type of movie and he loved killing people. Many people, some who were only very minor characters, were killed throughout this movie. Most of the deaths were caused by Bullseye but Daredevil was also responsible for some as well. He didn’t hesitate to kill someone if he believed they were guilty early in the movie. That was part of what made the movie darker since most superheroes don’t kill people. Later in the movie, he did have a change of feeling on that and seemed to be changing how he dealt with criminals. I have wondered if Daredevil was that deadly in the comic books. There were several fights throughout the movie, most of which were very violent. They did add some action and helped to keep things interesting. This really wasn’t a movie that young children should see. I did read that originally the movie was planned to have an R rating instead of PG-13. I think the movie pushed that rating as far as it was possible.
Certain things about the character of Matt/Daredevil did remind me of Bruce Wayne/Batman. Both men had their parents murdered when they were children. Both ended up dressing up to fight crime at night. Matt did have very enhanced senses that included a type of radar that allowed him to still see somewhat. Bruce had no special powers. Instead he was very intelligent and relied on all kinds of gadgets when he was dealing with criminals at Batman. Matt did have a few gadgets as well as having a hidden room in his home for the things he used as Daredevil. Both men would go after criminals that the justice system either wouldn’t or couldn’t go after. There were enough differences between the characters so it wasn’t like Daredevil was just a copy of Batman. Daredevil did also share a few things in common with Peter Parker/Spider-Man as well, including some common villains like the Kingpin. Nothing about Spider-Man was mentioned in Daredevil.
Matt and Elektra met and had their entire relationship play out during Daredevil. She was immediately interested in her and did what he could to pursue her. She did end up changing her mind about him and it was clear that they both had feelings for each other. It really didn’t take that long for them to start a sexual relationship. There was one sex scene between them that showed a bit of skin without showing any actual body parts. Their relationship was important to the movie without being the main focus. Complications were added to their relationship when her father was murdered. Without knowing that Matt was Daredevil, Elektra still pulled away from him because she was so focused on getting revenge.
Matt was a fairly complex character. He had managed to deal with losing his sight well and then he had to deal with his father being murdered. That drove him to deal with criminals as an adult. He did have some inner demons and had doubts that he was handling things as well as he could as Daredevil. He was an interesting character. Ben Affleck was fine in the part, though nothing special and it seemed like his acting could have been better.
Elektra was horribly under used and under developed. I know she wasn’t the main character, but she was very important to Matt and should have received more attention. She was a very strong, independent woman that could take care of herself in most situations. She was just as good as Daredevil with martial arts and was more of his equal instead of just being a damsel in distress that waited around for him to save her. I found out after seeing this movie that there was a lot more to this character. It would have been nice if she had been developed and utilized more. I thought that Jennifer Garner handled the part well.
The Kingpin was a very large, strong man who was a successful business man in addition to controlling all the criminals in town. He wouldn’t put up with anyone crossing him and wouldn’t hesitate to have people killed. He really wasn’t developed that much for being a main villain. Michael Clark Duncan was fine in the part. Bullseye was a deadly assassin who would kill people from a distance by throwing things at them. He would take any object available and use it to kill. He had a bullseye symbol on his forehead that did look a little odd. Colin Farrell did seem to go a little bit over the top in a few of his scenes. Joe Pantoliano appeared in a few scenes as Ben Urich, a reporter writing about Daredevil. Jon Favreau was fine in a couple of scenes as Matt’s law partner Franklin Nelson.
Main Cast
Ben Affleck - Matt Murdock/Daredevil Michael Clarke Duncan - The Kingpin Colin Farrell - Bullseye Jon Favreau - Franklin Nelson Jennifer Garner - Elektra David Keith - Jack Murdock Joe Pantoliano - Ben Urich Scott Terra - Young Matt
Mark Steven Johnson - Writer and Director
DVD Information
I have only seen Daredevil on DVD. I actually went ahead and got the DVD when it came out even though I hadn’t seen the movie since I usually like movies about superheroes. The copy I have is the two disc widescreen version. I’m not sure if there is a full screen version available. I do know there is another DVD out that includes the director’s cut version of the movie. I haven’t seen that version. The first disc included a directory and producer commentary, an on screen trivia track, enhanced viewing mode that would go behind scenes during the movie and DVD-ROM content.
Most of the extras were on the second disc. It started off with a menu with the option to pick either film or comic book. The film section had more extras than the comic one. There was a documentary on the making of the movie that showed many things connected with the filming of the movie. The director, producers, as well as some of the cast and crew talked about making the movie. It was shown how they decided on a look for Daredevil’s suit and all the work that went into that. The way that special effects were created for some scenes was explained as well as how some of the fight scenes were choreographed. Some of the editing process was shown and the composer talked about creating the music for the movie. I did think this contained some interesting information.
There was a short bit about Kingpin that really just had Michael Clarke Duncan talking about the character. There was an HBO First Look Special that was hosted by Jennifer Garner. It showed images from the comics as well as some scenes from the movie. Some background information on the characters was shared. Cast members and the director talked about the making of the movie. Several things that were discussed in this special had been in the making of Daredevil documentary and even the short thing about Kingpin. A featurette called A Day with Tom Sullivan was focused on Tom, a blind consultant for the movie. There were a few movie trailers, a still gallery and three music videos as well.
The comic section started off with a featurette called Men Without Fear:Creating Daredevil. Different writers and artists that had worked on the Daredevil comic over the years talked about the comic and how things had changed in it over the years. Stan Lee was the first man shown and he discussed how he developed the idea for a blind superhero. Before watching this, I hadn’t known that Frank Miller had been involved with the Daredevil comic. From the things shared from the story lines he was responsible for, it looked like a lot of the plot for the movie was pulled from Miller’s work, including the Elektra story arc. It did sound like a few things related to Elektra were toned down slightly for the movie. I really enjoyed hearing everyone talk about working on the comic and I learned a lot about the character from this.
A featurette called Shadow World Tour explored Daredevil’s senses and how they were depicted in the movie. Panels from the comics dealing with one of his senses were shown and then a scene from the movie that dealt with the same thing was shown. The things in the comics had been more detailed in explaining what was going on in certain scenes and also included some of Matt’s thoughts about what was going on. I did think it was interesting to see how his senses were incorporated into the movie. The modeling sheets for the looks of some of the characters were included.
I enjoyed Daredevil for the most part and felt it was an entertaining movie despite some flaws. Since I really knew nothing about the character before seeing the movie, I didn’t know if anything was really screwed up. That could be why I was able to enjoy the movie even though so many others have hated it.
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