Brightburn – Movie Review

Produced by James Gunn and written by Brian and Mark Gunn, Brightburn stars Elizabeth Banks and David Denman in the lead roles and narrates an alternate storyline of a kid gifted with superpowers. The plot kicks off when an alien spaceship crash lands on a farm in Kansas City and the couple who runs the farm discover a baby on board and decide to adopt him as they’re in a long unsuccessful process of having a child together. Flash forward a few years later, after experiencing a very positive and happy life as a child, the kid realizes that he is gifted with superhuman abilities and decides to utilize them to perform wrongful acts contrary to the hero we all know and love, the Superman.

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Marketed as a superhero-horror film, what worked in this 90-minute long narrative is surprisingly the emotion and the relationship between the kid and his parents. The character’s sentiments were exceptionally portrayed by well-written scenes which showcased more of the heart-warming side of the narrative. And the performances, especially from the two primary leads, Banks and Denman, were extremely good considering the fact that this is a low-budget horror film. They made me believe and feel for everything they’re going through as a couple and as adoptive parents of a young unhinged child. That’s not an easy feat to accomplish.

Another positive asset of Brightburn is the amount of Final-Destination-ish gore it is able to pack in between those ninety-minutes. It is freakishly scary and uncomfortable to watch at times and utilized the Rated-R rating decently. But, because the movie heavily advertised the anti-Superman angle in every promo, the storyline turned out to be easily predictable from start to finish. The script lacked uncertainty as everything from the jump-scares to the dialogue was foreseeable during the course of the runtime.

The movie overall worked well as an uncomical origin story, the kid’s character fells short motivation-wise, but, for a good reason. It had no real protagonist character cause we only see the lunatic Superboy slaughtering anything coming his way. And maybe we learn more about him in the sequel for which the groundwork has already been laid. Brightburn is in actuality a fresh new take on the origin story we’ve seen many times before. It is short, slick and gory to the fullest extent comprised with some fine performances from the lead cast. A fairly good appetizer before you make allowances for the Godzilla’s and the X-People in the coming weeks.

Rating – 3/5 | Grade – B