Though Better Than Expected, The 2003 Daredevil Movie Still Finds Itself Not Realizing Its Full Potential

Surprisingly, the 2003 feature film take on Daredevil does rise above a number of the middling or outright bad comic book movies that were being made in the era in which it was released. It's a thousand times better than Catwoman, it's far more interesting than The Punisher, it's less aggravating than the 2005 Fantastic Four film and I'd even go as far as to say it's at least on par with the 2000 X-Men movie in terms of overall quality. The problem here is that's probably the highest praise I can lather Daredevil with because it's still an erratic heavily flawed movie that's kept from being something truly special due to a pretty poor screenplay, though it does have its moments of charm or gusto goofiness, can't deny that.

Matt Murdoch (Ben Affleck) was hit by toxic waste as a child, removing his sight but enhancing his other senses to superhuman levels. That alone is enough to change anyone's life but the murder of his boxer father by an unknown mob boss further convinces Matt to use these newly enhanced senses of his to become a vigilante known as Daredevil. He patrols the streets of his hometown of New York City at night and then he does pro bono work as a lawyer during the daytime with his law partner Foggy Nelson (Jon Favreau). It's a double life that puts him constantly in the crosshairs of the criminal underworld.

The leader of that criminal underworld is Wilson Fisk (Michael Clarke Duncan), who seeks to get rid of Daredevil and remove his only source of constant opposition in having control over the city. In order to help him with this task as well as kill off a mouthy employee of his, Fisk hires expert marksman Bullseye (Collin Farrell) to come into the city and help him out. All the while, Murdoch, in his lawyer persona, is falling for a woman named Elektra Natchios (Jennifer Garner) who might just have some superpowers of her own that could come in handy when she goes on a mission of vengeance against Daredevil, whom she incorrectly blames for the death of her father.

It's all the Elektra plotlines that really drag down Daredevil as a movie, as the romantic interactions she has with Matt are super poorly done. Their relationship starts out with Matt stalking Elektra and then they spend a couple of scenes together exchanging badly written romantic dialogue and it's all of a sudden supposed to be the entire emotional spine of the movie. Hinging so much of the film on these two and their romance was a bad idea considering how poorly handled it is and the fact that they rush through a big Elektra moment from the comics in the third act just reinforces how badly this thing's script is when it comes to handling Elektra Natchios.

It's a pity so much screentime gets wasted on a badly written version of this character because a surprisingly large amount of Daredevil at least rises to the level of diverting fun. It'd probably be a lot more fun if the action sequences weren't frequently filmed in a poor manner that overemphasizes slow-motions and haphazard editing, but at least the script allows the moments of superhero action to be appropriately over-the-top. No attempts at gritty realism here folks, instead, you get Collin Farrell hamming it the hell up as Bullseye, a guy who has a target....birthmark(?) on his forehead and delivers all his dialogue in a delightfully absurd manner.

Michael Clarke Duncan also turns out to be an appropriately intimidating Wilson Fisk, even though he doesn't get enough to do, he's at least able to come off as a great version of this character in his minimal screentime. Conversely, I wish Ben Affleck had more personality as Daredevil, but he's got his moments where he really shines as the character and I would have been curious to see what he could have done as Matt Murdoch in a much better movie. He's working here under the direction of filmmaker Mark Steven Johnson, who also penned the script. Johnson's affinity for fully embracing the stylized aspects of the comic book he's adapting is admirable especially in an age where that didn't happen in superhero movies unless Sam Raimi was behind the camera.

His script, on the other hand, leaves a lot to be desired as it leaves it's delightfully over-the-top baddies as well as any attempts to really make either or both Matt Murdoch or Elektra Notchios interesting characters on the sidelines far too often. That very same screenplay also has an oddly rushed third act that feels like it speeds right past big revelations and character-changing moments in the blink of an eye. That's a real shame because there are some big bright spots in Daredevil, more than I expected to be fully honest. Alas, though it is better than many other superhero films of its era, Daredevil still can't rise to true greatness, though that one scene of Elektra training to the tune of Wake Me Up Inside by Evanescence doe rises to such levels of quality.