Martin Scorsese is, of course, cinematic legend. He is also an explorer of forms and genres, which give hope one day that he would direct a superhero movie. If only to show everyone else what they've been doing wrong with them all this time.
That is certainly fantasy, but we can study the master's techniques to try to find a different path for our supermen and women on the screen. In this article we give the Goodfellas treatment to The Flash by way of Menace II Society.
Economy of Screentime
The vast majority of SH films fail in utilizing their time, even the good ones. A common complaint in SH movies is that it is impossible to cram decades of story into a single movie. Consider, however, how much happens in GF in its 2.5 hour running time.
Early Henry cabstand hijinx including his first bust
An introduction to all the background players and Jimmy
Meeting and Falling in love with Karen
Air France Heist
The Wedding and early married life
The Lufthansa Heist
Prison
Drug Running
Marital problems to the extreme
Final bust, trial, and Witness Protection Program "death"
The point is, that the majority of SH movies do not have this level of detail in their work, even though they have literally hundreds of stories to draw from. The main culprit? " One Hero, One Villain, One Plot ".
Now a caveat to this complaint isn't to Batman and Robin it into a convoluted mess. Just dumping characters into a movie isn't going to do the job. You don't need to see EVERY origin and back story to know their relationship with the protagonist.
But just look how many players there are in GF. Most of them are introduced all at once, and while their activity is secondary to the Henry Hill tread, even if some of them are never seen again they add richness and history to the environment.
Henry Hill is the main tread of GF, and everything we see in the film isn't just related to Henry, it is entwined. We see everything through his eyes, and if it doesn't relate directly to him, it usually happens off-screen. When we do get away from Henry, its usually short trip and for a major plot point. It is his life we are watching, everything else is extraneous.
Multiple Plot and Character Threads
GF is Henry Hill's story, but it’s a part of dozens of stories that entwine with Henry's life. Pauly, Jimmy, Tommy, and Karen are fully realized characters. Others like Stacks, Spider, Karen's Mom, Frenchy, Morry, Tommy's Mom, are all background characters, but they all feel like they have lives on their own. And everyone ADDS to the Hank's story, even if indirectly.
It’s a cohesive environment that makes sense. Running Henry through the story, we see him and others react to their environment in naturalistic manner. Look at the number of stories told in the span of the film. Each act is like a mini-movie that propels the main story. Players change, but it all builds to one goal, recounting Henry’s rise and fall. Managing this all is difficult, but it all comes down to this: Take the time to work it out. It is worth it.
I mentioned the issue of “One Hero, One Villain, One Plot”, but fortunately Barry has a nice way out of this conundrum… The Rogues. These guys are perfect fodder for Barry to build his powers. Lets face it, once The Flash learns how to fully use his powers, these guys are toast.
After Barry becomes The Flash, he leaps into action battling the individual Rogues and other challenges (I’d love to see the prison riot in action) in quick sequences. These are our introductions to these characters. Commander Cold realizes they aren’t going to stop him alone, and organizes the city’s super villains. At the same time we see Barry develop more and more of his powers and techniques (running up wall, vortexes, etc). We also see Central City and its people in these scenes were we establish The Flash’s growing popularity amongst the citizens.
All of this happens concurrently, and not necessarily on-screen.
Point of View
Here is the key. We don’t see this group up; we don’t see the origin of Captain Boomerang. We don’t need too, and in fact anything that happens outside of Barry’s perspective is usually not going to be shown. We find out about the story the way Barry does, by Barry experiencing it.
Bringing this back to GF, everything is through Henry’s eyes, with the exception of a few scenes (Tommy getting wacked for one), and he is never gone more than he needs to be. However, the world is so developed it feels like all of the characters have their own stories, their own lives.
I’m usually not a fan of voice-overs in films in general, but I think its odd that this method has been little used in SH movies. After all, the originating format is full of character’s inner thoughts tucked away in caption squares. Watchmen was one of the standouts, and I think the technique was utilized perfectly. GF is voice over heavy, and I think the method would work well with Barry.
Three Act Structure
This goes for most movies, but SH movies in particular are stuck in this mold. FILM CRIT HULK has a lot to say about this, so I'll let him give you the skinny on why three act structure is the bane of good storytelling.
The deadweight of most SH movies is the second act. The act that makes you wait literally half the movie for what you already know is coming. HULK defined act breaks by an event/decision the story/characters can’t go back from, and I like that definition a lot.
By dumping this structure and opting for an open act story, we give ourselves the freedom from its second act swallowing up screen time for no good reason, and allows for a structure that fits the needs of the film, rather than relying on a 100-year-old-plus story structure based on irrelevant theater traditions.
Let’s put this all together to give Barry his powers in a propulsive manner by mimicking the opening to GF:
Scene - Crime Lab, Late Evening. A man silently checks a centrifuge, makes a notation, does some more "science" in a slow methodological manner. Once he is done he sits down and continues reading his golden age Jay Garruk "The Flash" comic.
The silence is broken by a thunderous bolt of lighting and a freeze frame on:
BARRY ALLEN - VO
All my life I wanted to be a Superhero.
Music Cue
Cut to Black and then Fade in
Barry wakes in a trashed lab, bleary and trying to focus on a clock. Once he realizes the time, he runs (normally) out the door and sees a vacant cab just pass by. Barry starts to run after the cab (again normally), but as it speeds away Barry keeps up with it, focused on the driver and not how fast he is running. When Barry does catch up to the cab, the driver looks down at his speedometer at 60mph, and up at Barry with an incredulous look on his face. The cab veers off to another road as Barry now realizes how fast he has been running.
He slows down, stops, and stares at the empty stretch of road, wide eyed and contemplating the meaning of this transformation.
TITLE
In about 3 minutes we get to about 30 minutes into most SH movies. Origins are BORING, but most of the stuff that’s pre-origin is even more so. Do we need to see Barry’s life before we see the actual accident, or can we provide any important information later in a more economical way?
The point of this exercise is that our comic book and superhero movies are being pressed into a mold. There are a thousand ways to structure a film, and since these genres are getting stale in there structure, its time to look at alternatives.