Madame Web (2024) Review

 "When you take on the responsibility, great power will come."
-Santiago

Cassie Webb (Dakota Johnson), a New York paramedic, hits her head in an accident, which unlocks the ability to see glimpses of the future.  When she sees Ezekiel Sims (Tahar Rahim) attempting to murder three teenage girls, Cassie intervenes to save them.  As Cassie learns to understand her power, she also discovers the connection between her, the girls, and Ezekiel.

What Works:

I think the core idea at the center of this movie is a good one and has the potential to be interesting.  Cassie's superpowers are kinda lame.  It's not like they're going to help in a combat situation.  Ezekiel is basically evil Spider-Man.  He has legitimate powers and is a massive threat.  That's an interesting conflict.  How does someone with lackluster superpowers take on a supervillain.  It's a fun idea that I would like to see tried again with greater success. 

What Sucks:

This movie was embarrassing to watch.  Honestly.  It's embarrassing that this was made the way it was and that people felt this was okay to release.  Nobody does a good job and it felt like most of the people involved weren't even trying.  It fails on every level.  A friend of mine called this The Room of superhero movies and frankly I agree.  It falls into so-bad-it's-good territory

Dakota Johnson is straight up terrible.  I've never seen her in anything else, so I don't know if it's totally her fault, but she's very unlikable as a protagonist.  We aren't given any reason to connect to her or like her.  Cassie is just a mess of a character.  And the teenagers she's taking care of aren't likable either.  There isn't a single reason for us as an audience to care about any of them.  They spend most of the time fighting with each other and making stupid decisions.  They aren't interesting enough as characters to be so unlikable.

Even worse is our villain, Ezekiel.  I don't even know what to make of this.  Most of his dialogue is ADR and it's very badly done.  It's obvious at times that the dialogue is not what the actor originally said.  Sometimes you can even see that his lips don't match the audio.  It's embarrassingly bad and I know this movie had a bunch of reshoots, but the audio quality still isn't acceptable.  I laughed during most of Ezekiel's dialogue and he's not supposed to be a funny character.

The cinematography is just a mess with the camera zipping all over the place.  Through in the obnoxious sound design, especially in Cassie's visions, and that film feels nauseating at times.  

Finally, the writing overall is simply nonsensical.  There were points where I had no idea what was happening or why.  

Verdict:

Madame Web is one of the worst movies I've ever seen in theaters.  While the initial idea is interesting, nothing else in this movie works.  The directing, performances, sound, writing, and cinematography are all an absolute mess.  It's hard to say who is at fault when everything failed so much.  All that said, I found the movie entertaining to watch.  It's definitely so-bad-it's-good and I think it will end up being a cult classic, but if I were involved with the production of this film,  I would be embarrassed.

 1/10: Horrendous