Director Alex Proyas‘ vision of James O’Barr’s comic book, The Crow, firmly rooted itself in the pop culture pantheon, a defining film of the ’90s for its dreamy gothic style and the tragic on-set passing of its star, Brandon Lee. Proyas‘ take on The Crow was so singular and successful that it launched a film franchise and a TV series. All of which to say that with the 1994 adaptation so firmly embedded in the minds of multiple generations, director Rupert Sanders’ new adaptation faced an uphill battle from the start. Sanders does maintain his vow to give Proyas’ film a wide berth in favor of forging new ground with the material, but the filmmaker struggles to give his film much of an identity at all beyond a lucid dream aesthetic.
In this take on The Crow, written by Zach Baylin (King Richard) and Will Schneider, Eric (Bill Skarsgård) is a troubled youth who meets the love of his life, Shelly (FKA twigs), at a detention center. There’s just one pesky problem interrupting the couple’s honeymoon phase, though. Shelly’s tied to a video that contains evidence of crime lord Vincent Roeg’s (Danny Huston) misdeeds, and he’s sent his henchmen to track down all involved. When Roeg succeeds, Eric finds he has a second chance to enact vengeance and right the wrongs of the dead.
Danny Huston as Vincent Roeg in The Crow. Photo Credit: Aleksandar Letic
Narratively, The Crow spends the bulk of its efforts on establishing the central romance driving Eric forward. The tender bond between Eric and Shelly gets more care and attention than any other aspect of the plot, including its antagonist. Roeg’s introduction in the film raises intrigue; this crime lord is also demonic in nature. Save for a couple of minor parlor tricks, though, The Crow never really gets acquainted with its main Big Bad or establishes him as any threat. Instead, Huston is wasted as a mildly annoyed, generic crime boss-type villain.
That’s one of the smaller glaring issues with The Crow, though. Sanders introduces a spirit realm, complete with an enigmatic guide Kronos (Sami Bouajila), where reality and time distort into a disorienting lucid dream. Yet that dreamlike state pervades the entire film, from beginning to end. Scenes just sleepily drift into each other, seemingly without purpose, dampening any story impact in the process. The disorienting aesthetic works well for Eric’s journey, especially in key scenes with Kronos, but much less so as a whole.
FKA Twigs as Shelly and Bill Skarsgård as Eric in The Crow. Photo Credit: Larry Horricks
That this Crow can’t quite decide on what it wants to be only further creates a disorienting feeling. While iconic mantras do get resurrected and repurposed here, the mythology behind Eric’s resurrection is largely forgotten. Or rather, the crow itself is cast aside and treated as almost a nonfactor. The film spends so much time building the mystery behind what’s on that video and Shelly’s romance that the action comes far too late. While Sanders does commit to spilling copious amounts of blood, most of it VFX-fueled, it’s mostly confined to a bland third act. It’s also worth pointing out that said third act is what’s primarily featured in the trailers, a sign that it’s going to take a while for the vengeance part of this revenge story to kick in.
The Crow does have fresh ideas on its mind, particularly over the nature of souls and redemption, but it’s so confoundedly executed that it, pardon the pun, drowns out the more fascinating aspects of Sanders’ approach. The violence and action are as weightless as Eric’s story. Sure, there’s blood aplenty, but Eric heals faster than Wolverine, and the henchmen he culls down are forgettable and interchangeable. Even Shelly and Eric’s murder is tame, at least by comparison.
Instead of a bold new vision, The Crow offers a confusing, uninteresting sleepwalk through a disjointed dream of a comic book movie.
The Crow is now playing in theaters nationwide.