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Once Parallax is on the loose again, it falls to Abin Sur — the Green Lantern of Sector 2814 — to track him down. The chase leaves the hero mortally wounded, however, and forces him to crash-land his ship on a little blue backwater planet in his sector, a place called Earth. The alien (played by Temuera Morrison) commands his power ring, a mystical charm that harnesses the wearer's willpower to create whatever he can think of, to locate a suitable Lantern replacement. Enter Hal Jordan, a fearless (some say reckless) former U.S. Air Force aviator and test pilot for Ferris Aircraft, in fictional Coast City, California. Jordan has a convoluted past, including serious daddy issues and an on-again off-again relationship with the boss's daughter, Carol Ferris (Blake Lively). But, the ring picks him to be the next Green Lantern and magically transports him to Abin Sur's side, just in time to hear the dying ET's last words about power and responsibility.
Jordan calls his friend and fellow Ferris employee, Tom Kalmaku (Taika Waititi), to pick him up from the scene of the crash — just ahead of the police and the inevitable mysterious government agency types who arrive to cover up the evidence. They also recover Abin Sur's body, which will be important to the continuing thrust of the story at some point down the line. A superhero film will most likely succeed when its framework is well-defined. GREEN LANTERN tends to suffer from this lack of definition. The origin story requires the film to be told on a cosmic scale, traveling from Ryut to Earth to Oa, home planet of the so-called Guardians of the Universe, the near-immortal beings who first forged the Green Lantern Corps' power rings. The film does have some redeeming qualities. Jordan's journey to Oa, for example, is a triumph of CGI special effects. The ring sends him there for orientation and training; as the first human to be chosen as a Green Lantern, he has a lot to learn and a wide variety of teachers: the kind and thoughtful Tomar-Re (voiced by Geoffrey Rush), the brutish drill sergeant Kilowog (voiced by Michael Clarke Duncan) and the slightly devious Sinestro (Mark Strong). The vistas, while virtual, convey a real sense of otherworldy wonder. This grand scope, however, also makes it difficult to portray that these are meant to be human beings with real issues, emotions and motivations. You would think that an embodiment of pure fear would be enough to serve as a supervillain but the producers chose to give Parallax an agent on Earth, as well: Dr. Hector Hammond, a college biology teacher who, through contacts with his U.S. senator father, is drafted to autopsy that recently discovered extraterrestrial corpse. Hammond, ably depicted by actor Peter Sarsgaard as a hapless nerd who lusts after Ferris and envies Jordan, is accidentally exposed to Parallax's fearful DNA while probing Abin Sur's wounds. The contact transforms him, inside and out, giving him telepathic skills and telekinetic powers to rival any Green Lantern.
Will Hal Jordan use his new-found power to stop Hammond, protect the woman he loves, and save the planet Earth from Parallax? The answer is a foregone conclusion, but getting there is supposed to be half the fun. In the case of GREEN LANTERN, it just isn't. I am reminded, ironically, of the scene from the film AMADEUS, when the Emperor is asked his opinion of Mozart's latest work: "Too many notes," the monarch replies. Less is more. The fact that it is often repeated doesn't make it any less true. GREEN LANTERN tries to do too much in too short an amount of time. This is not to suggest that it should have been longer; it is to suggest that it should have been structured differently from the first frame. Ryan Reynolds reportedly said that his new film wouldn't be like other superhero origin stories, "where the movie begins in the third act." Well, that certainly turned out to be the case, but I don't think it is fair to ask the average moviegoer to absorb that much information in one sitting. They should have told the straightforward origin story first, and saved the grand cosmic epic for another time. GREEN LANTERN should have been the ultimate five-star blockbuster summer film. By overreaching, though, it turns into a very average outing, no better than a three-star result.
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