Defendor: Review By B. Alan Orange

The most pertinent thing to be said for Defendor is that it's a beautiful looking movie. Though sold as a low budget one-off, the scope photography on display is gorgeous. It looks and feels like a vivid four-color comic book brought to life. And it distracts from the story in some ways. Cinematographer David Greene is playing at a different level than director/writer Peter Stebbings. A film of this pedigree shouldn't look this stunning to the eye. And it pulls away from the story that is being told. Luckily, Woody Harrelson knows how to play both to the lens and to the narrative that's strapped to his back with a little too much glee on his part. Is it entertaining? Yes. Is it a B movie? Yes. Does it look like something we'd see at the Drive-IN? Nope. This sucker breathes like a set of photographs in an art gallery.

The origin story behind Woody's "superhero of sorts" is one that's been told many times in the recent past. It falls into the "human with no powers posing as a comic book character" subgenre that has seen Michael Rapport run into walls via Special and will soon find Nicolas Cage jaunting about in Kick-Ass. This is not a new subgenre, and Harrelson's Defendor/Arthur Poppington archetype reaches as far back as John Ritter's Captain Avenger/Steve Nichols in Hero at Large. Poppington is a dimwit vigilante who takes his after hours job a little bit too seriously. An illiterate orphan, he was the kind of kid who only ever looked at the pictures in comic books. Never really understanding the mythos behind them. Well into his forties, he only becomes a mask avenger after he saves a child from being struck by a car. The "hero" clatter that surrounded this incident goes straight to his head, and before you know it, he's fashioning a suit out of garbage bags and duct tape. He looks like he's gearing up to wrestle Sunnyvale's Green Bastard at any moment.

The film doesn't dwell on Defendor's coming-of-age fascination with gadgets and silly costumes. We only see these meager beginnings as a super hero in flashback. The script is set on a three-tier system that jumps back and forth at whim. When we first meet Poppington, he is talking to a prison psychiatrist (Sandra Oh). Harrelson plays the character as a Forrest Gump-type retard. He's movie star handicapable, and doesn't appear to have any outward symptoms of Down Syndrome. He sits, smiling like a loon, chewing on rubber bands. He tells the truth, and it's strange. Woody has this bugged out look in his eyes. He is creepy. Yet enduring. He looks like a Saturday morning cartoon character. And We can't help but like him. He's just not all there. He's been emotionally crippled, and intellectually hindered by his less than stellar upbringing.

During the day, Poppington works in road construction, holding up a stop sign, spinning it at will, unmindful of the oncoming traffic. At night, he becomes this dark shadow of a man running across rooftops and leaping into garbage cans in his small section of the city. Beating on any lowlife criminal that he comes across. It's a strange world, occupied by no more than twelve people at a time. Like any given comic strip, we never quite believe that these characters exist off the panels being presented to us in flip-fashion. Even though it supposedly takes place in the real world, Defendor seems contained within its own little box. Which is slightly claustrophobic. It feels more like a real comic book than a lot of the big budget Hollywood superhero films do.

This is a character study first and foremost. The storyline is almost secondary. After we get a sense of Poppington's mental state, we are rushed to one of his late night revelries. He joyfully bounds from store top to store top, looking for any off sort of element. He spots Undercover Cop Chuck Dooney (Elias Koteas) eliciting a blowjob from his hooker muse Kat (Kat Dennings), and proceeds to beat the living sh*t out of him. Defendor soon finds himself in a very empty jail, talking with two patrolmen who eventually let him escape. And continue to let him escape throughout the duration of the film. Defendor is on a mission. He wants to find and obliterate Captain Industry. Who may or may not be a real person. And that is the gist of his personal tale.

Who is Captain Industry? Kat, the lowly hooker with a heart of gold, pretends to know his secret identity. After she is shunned by Dooney, who has been keeping her fed and on the dust, Kat goes to live with Poppington in his Batcave of sorts, which is really just the road construction utility shed that is in the process of being moved across town. Together, Defendor and the Gold Hearted Hooker team up to uncover a most nefarious plot. Before Arthur can get his man, though, he gets locked up for stuffing Kat's dad into a wastebasket just outside of the man's dry cleaning business. Moments after throwing him through a window. Is Poppington dangerous? Yes. But everyone seems to love him. In the third act, Arthur's boss Paul Carter (Michael Kelly) takes Poppington into his home. We learn that it's his kid that Defendor saved. And it's a very interesting, detailed friendship had between the two.

There are some very surprising relationships in the film. And it could almost be a poignant drama if it weren't for the numerous action scenes that Stebbings peppers throughout his runtime. In one last final hurrah, Defendor takes on Captain Industry, and it doesn't end well. When it's firing on all cylinders, the film is quite entertaining. But some of it is very loose. And jarring. Some of it doesn't make sense at times. It's almost a good movie. Never a great one. Yet, it has some of the best performances the comic book genre has seen as of late. Should you check it out? Definitely. If just for Woody. He's a great dim bulb, and despite the lesser machinations on display, we're rooting for him at the end. The film gets a Whoop-doo!

(All of B. Alan Orange's reviews are based on the Boo! or Whoop-doo! evaluation system.)