With conviction, great acting, straight up gore, a
tight earnest sardonic script and perfect plotting, Brightburn knows to deliver
the goods as it has nothing else to prove, but tell the alternate story of
Superman’s origins. What if Superman was bad?
The Breyers (played by Elizabeth Banks and David
Denman) have been trying to get pregnant for sometime with no avail, but when a
spaceship crash lands on their farm, their prays have been answered the form of
a baby boy they name Brandon. Years later as their son Brandon grows to
puberty, he discovers he has alien powers. As his 12th birthday arrives, the
frustrations of a preteen come to head, and his new found abilities take on a
whole new devastating meaning, when he decides to lash out.
“Superhero Horror” is trending very quickly these
days as Superhero films are dominating the theatres and as well, Horror movies.
David Yarovesky directs this urgent, poignantly made hybrid with the inspired
tone of James Gunn at the producing helm and his brothers - Brian and Mark Gunn
writing. With that, like James Gunn’s Slither (also featuring Elizabeth Banks)
Brightburn takes a great b movie premise and takes it to the it’s darkest
realms, without flinching compromise and with absolute indifferent sarcasm
towards the Superhero genre. James Gunn (director of Guardians of the Galaxy)
knows both genres and completely understands the value in exploring the grim
reality a person with special abilities faces being an instant outsider, and
the pressure to be a hero in a thankless world. Brightburn wants to immediately
expose the Superman mythos for want it really us. Superman is an alien first
and foremost and he wouldn’t exactly know what to do with his powers as a kid.
Being an outsider in all respects Superman would be bound to do awful things
with his powers before he would be able to do good, that’s just part of his
growing up. And Brightburn wants you to be scared of Brandons’s foreign
perspective to our human world as we probably should be, and at 1 hour and 30
minutes, David Yarovesky doesn’t waste a single frame to convey this 12-year
old’s ability to destroy you.
Elizabeth Banks does her best work here playing
Brandon Breyer’s trusting mom. Truly expressing the denial and desperation of
wanting her son to be a normal human boy and not someone capable of murder. If
there is a bias against Horror at the Oscars let’s hope it lifts in time for
Lupita Nyongo to get a nomination for Us and for just as well Elizabeth Banks
to finally get her first nomination. This is the role for exactly that. Jackson
A. Dunn is a perfect choice as the cold, disconnected and misunderstood
Brandon, and plays the role extremely frighteningly alien. David Denman using
his hard nose yet reliable character style such as his role in The Office, is
undeniably suitable as Brandon’s earth Dad, whom he appropriately bumps heads
with.
Like a one-off Twilight Zone episode, Brightburn is
creepy, terrifying, thought provoking and thrilling all at once, and
delightfully so. Un-compromised, efficient and refreshingly inspired,
Brightburn gives you want you expect and more and has fun doing so, while
delivering an important chilling message and a new perspective on the Superhero
genre, and adding some new tricks to the Horror one. 9/10.
- Maurice Jones
