Shazam sure casts, literally and figuratively, a magical spell!! Shazam Review!

To be truthful enough, I don\’t like fantasy or superhero movies at all. But this seemed like a different take on the superhero genre and boy I was right!!

This movie is about boyish charm, that teen age fantasy of possessing superhero powers, the exquisite comic dialogues written, which so far I believed was the copyright of Deadpool in the superhero genre! In fact, it seems like a Bollywood movie to an extent, where all the ingredients, viz. family drama, internal anguish, emotions disguised as angels and demons are all there. The central character Billy\’s transformation from his incessant search for his biological mother to getting a new family and maturing emotionally in the due course adds a different shade to the normal bad beats evil stereotype of this genre. If one were to look at it from a philosophical or mythological perspective, the six evils have been well documented in the Hindu mythology (seven in Christian scriptures). These are the root cause of all the Evil that pervades the universe.

Look closely enough, and we can notice two sort of Easter eggs :

1. Billy\’s latest foster mum has a number plate that says \”I am foster mum what is your superpower?\” and…

2. While Shazam is being thrashed left right and centre by Dr Sivans and falls into a a soft toy stall, a child and his father seem to have been frightened by the larger than life titanic scale fighting. Shazam hands over a soft Tiger toy to the kid saying everything will be fine. It was the tiger toy that little Billy wanted from his mom all the while, but couldn\’t get it.

Definitely a movie with top notch out of the blue comic timing and dialogues. Director David Sandberg who is well known for making the \’Conjuring Universe\’ and other short horror films, delves into a different area, and quite successfully at that!! Asher Angel perfectly plays the boyish charm with \”hollow and searching for his mother eyes\”. Zachary Levi too successfully maintains the boyish charm of the 14 year old Billy. Mark Strong who already has a strong array of films to his credit, adds another feather to his cap, that is character of supervillain doctor Sivana.

By the way, one more reason why this superhero is deadpool\’s bro! Don\’t leave your seats till the hall lightens up and the screen darkens. There\’s a follow up scene after the credits roll.

Seems like I might see a couple more from this superhero genre!! What about you? Did you see this movie? What was your first impression?? Do let me know in the comments section..