It’s basically ‘End of Watch’ mixed with ‘The Lord of the Rings’ but not as good.
Starring Will Smith, Joel Edgerton, Lucy Fry, Noomi Rapace and Edgar Ramirez, ‘Bright’ is the newest and most expensive Netflix movie to date, with David Ayer (‘End of Watch’, ‘Fury’ and ‘Suicide Squad’) at the helm.
Set in an alternative, fantasy version of Earth, ‘Bright’ follows a human cop, Ward (Will Smith), who is forced to work with the first ever Orc cop, Jakoby (Joel Edgerton), in crime-ridden Los Angeles. But when they find a dangerous weapon and a young female elf (Lucy Fry), they must work together and fend off an onslaught of enemies who are after the weapon that could destroy the world.
First of all, this isn’t a good movie. I originally thought that this was going to be a Netflix original series, which would have worked a lot better compared to a two-hour movie.
There are a couple of positives I had with ‘Bright’ so it’s not all bad.
The first positive is Joel Edgerton as Jakoby. He easily gives us the best performance in ‘Bright’ and he manages to play an outcast who isn’t liked by anyone really quite well. Although he does a solid job, everyone else doesn’t really put the effort into it. I’ll talk about the other performances soon.
The other positive I had with ‘Bright’ was the concept. A modern-day world where you have Humans, Elves, Orcs and Fairies living amongst each other is a great idea. It made me want to watch ‘Bright’ and the concept is much better than the execution.
Now, I have to move onto the negatives, starting with the other performances. Will Smith seems like he doesn’t want to be there. He puts little effort into the performance and he comes across as unlikeable for the majority of the movie. But this does have a lot to do with the writing which will be talked about shortly. Noomi Rapace was also pretty average in the movie, which also might be because her character is only on-screen for about five-ten minutes at most. She’s also supposed to be the villain, but she seems like she is more of an obstacle for the protagonists to avoid instead of a menacing villain that she is supposed to be.
Onto what is easily the worst part of the ‘Bright’, the writing. It seems like the writers think the audience is dumb as they explain literally everything that happens throughout. They reveal things early on which could have been easily guessed correctly by the average viewer. There is also a lot of cheesy dialogue, with the best being “We are the calvary” and “I am the city.” It makes you wonder if the writers actually put any effort into it or if they even knew how to write a movie script.
I should also talk about the chemistry between Will Smith and Joel Edgerton, or the lack of chemistry between them. Even though they are supposed to hate each other, there are so many similar movies where people who hate each other have to work together and they always have great chemistry. Here though there is no chemistry and it’s really disappointing.
The directing from David Ayer is also pretty average. I know that he is a good director from some of his previous work, but here it just falls flat. This is very noticeable in the action sequences, which are just so bland to watch. Most of the action takes place in the dark and the lighting makes them pretty average. The editing also seems pretty choppy in parts which can really take you out of it.
Overall, ‘Bright’ is a pretty average Netflix original movie which should have been a lot better than what it was. Even though there is some enjoyment in ‘Bright’ and you can see pieces of a great movie, the overall execution is poor and it makes for a lacklustre viewing experience.
Rating: 2.3/5
andycritiques 