Death Note
Director - Adam Wingard
Writers - Charles Parlapanides, Vlas Parlapanides and Jeremy Slater
Starring - Nat Wolff, Margaret Qually, LaKeith Stanfield, Shea Whigham, Willem Dafoe
Adam Wingard's Death Note is a fantasy-vigilante story, a teen drama mystery, a wacky horror comedy, a semi-generic detective crime thriller and a coming-of-age drama. Needless to say it isn't any good. We'll get to breaking down the individual elements but first it feels necessary to address the thing seemingly dominating conversation about this movie, the white-washing. Yes, this is an adaptation of a Japanese manga/anime series and it has been transported to Seattle and now stars the very generic looking white boy Nat Wolff. I'm not familiar at all with the original material and have no bone to pick in this fight but if Wingard had kept the story in Japan and cast a Japanese actor in the role of Light Turner, the only difference would have been a possibly competent leading performance. With an inept star, a confused script and mostly generic direction Death Note is the latest misfire from Netflix.
Light Turner is a generic movie teenager. He is quiet and shy and smart and bullied and looks to be in his mid-twenties. One day, while serving detention for being bullied he finds a mysterious book and just starts flipping through it, as one does. This summons Ryuk (Dafoe) who acts as malevolent spirit guide in the art of magic death for you see, when Light writes a name in this book, that person dies. Being a sensible person, Light decides to start killing all the bad guys in the world: murderers, rapists, terrorists, pedophiles, the works. This makes him a folk hero and global crime numbers plummet. He essentially becomes magic Dexter, ridding the entire world of evil. Any potential for growth in this story is never realized as other elements of the film take over and the biggest personal demon Light has to fight over these powers is his girlfriend.
Mia Sutton (Qualley) is seemingly Light's only friend in school. One day he just up and shows her his magic death book not knowing that she has a massive death fetish. They start boning and she becomes obsessed with the book and using it to murder as many people as she can at the same time Light starts figuring out that there may be a catch this monkey paw situation. This leads to teen drama suitable for something like Riverdale but with a magical death book in the middle of everything. This is another element that doesn't work because this movie has no idea what it wants to be. The climax of this story takes place on a Ferris Wheel complete with Final Destination-style death machinisms and a hilariously over the top musical cue.
Adam Wingard's bread and butter is horror. You're Next, The Guest, segments of V/H/S, Blair Witch: Wingard is a horror director. Some of his filmography has been injected with comedic elements in the past, You're Next being a perfect example. He attempts to bring that element of his work over to Death Note and spectacularly fails at it. The one positive thing I have to say about Wingard trying his hand at making this into a wacky horror comedy is that it is the only element of the film that feels like it has a distinct personality and wasn't crafted in a mindless studio system. Seemingly everything else in this film is played as safe as possible but then at random intervals weird attempts at horrific humour come out of nowhere. The first death is a sub-par Final Destination style chain reaction culminating in a graphic decapitation. It's over the top nature suggests that it is a joke, but it simply isn't funny. Very little in this film is purposely funny except maybe the giant prom hat. That's a good gag. The real problem from these attempts at humour and personality is how much they clash with the rest of the movie, especially the parts involving L (Stanfield), the best, and only interesting, character.
L is a mystic detective of sorts who specializes in solving unsolvable cases so naturally he gets interested in the entire criminal population of the world dying. Stanfield continues to prove himself as one of the best young actors working today as he manages to completely ground L's story as the super detective who comes face to face with the one case he can't bring in. For you see, L figures out that Light is behind everything pretty quickly but is thwarted when Light's father (Whigham), who is the Chief of Police in Seattle refused to believe him and turns the cops against L. Even the ridiculous dinner scene Wingard tries to make funny works because Stanfield refuses to go there and stubbornly keeps his character, and the scenes he's in, consistent. The detective story is really the one part of the film that works and Wingard throws it away at the end to go back to the ever-terrible Nat Wolff and his problems.
Sure it makes sense, Light is your protagonist. You opened the story with him, you kinda have to close it with him but fuck it. I don't care about what the original story does or what thousands of years of storytelling convention tell you to do. When the very presence of your "protagonist" on screen is bringing the film down and you already have a well established side-plot that could easily slot in and finish up the movie, and that side plot centers around a conflict involving the best actor and character you have, why not throw everything out the window and try something different? Anyways, as alluded to, Light and Mia get into a spat about who's name should be in the murder book (spoiler, it's both of them) and then they go to a Ferris Wheel and then "I Don't Wanna Live Without Your Love" plays as it comes down and then Light reflects on everything he learns, explains the "crazy" twists that allow him to escape everything, and gives a monologue about how much he's grown as a person. It's bad.
Schurmann Score - 1/10
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