Fantastic Four (Widescreen Edition)

Jessica Alba (Sue Strong/Invisible Girl), Ioan Gruffudd (Reed Richards/Mr. Fantastic), Julian McMahon (Victor Von Doom), Michael Chiklis (Ben Grimm/Thing), and Chris Evans (Johnny Storm/Human Torch) star in this thrilling movie based on the successful comic adventures.Reed Richards, an MIT alum and former classmate of Victor, presents Victor with a proposal to send himself, Sue, Ben, Johnny, and Victor into space to study human DNA. Victor, who owns a billion-dollar company, agrees to finance the mission and accompany Reed and his crew on their journey. Their destination is a space station, where they will conduct their experiments. However, a strange gaseous cloud is moving toward the station. Originally given hours to conduct their experiment, the cloud suddenly increases its speed and is on top of the station in a matter of minutes. All five members are exposed to cosmic radiation from the cloud.Upon returning to earth, everything seems normal for a while. However, each person begins to notice physical changes; Johnny begins finding that he can make a flame by snapping his thumb, Sue realizes that she can disappear, Reed finds that his body can now stretch in ways it never could before, but Ben's new "ability" is most noticable. He now looks like a giant orange rock-like figure. He even frightens his beloved wife Debbie away. Victor, who's company stock has went into free-fall due to the failed mission, has been given one week to turn his company around by his investors. He also begins to show signs of change.The group's first public exposure occurs on the Brooklyn Bridge. Ben is sitting on its railing when a would-be suicide jumper approaches. Ben tries to talk to the man, but it only frustrates the jumper more. Soon, the man is hanging onto a cable above the roadway, but eventually loses his grip and falls into oncoming traffic. This starts a chain-reaction collision. Ben, meanwhile, is trying to get through the mess of wrecked vehicles when a fire truck slams on its brakes and sends its rear section flying over the edge of the bridge. Using his now incredible strength, he manages to pull the truck back to safety, while Reed uses his elactic arms to rescue a falling firefighter. After this show of bravery, the local media give the group the name "Fantastic 4".Meanwhile, Victor is still seething over the loss of his company. He blames Reed for messing up the mission. Even Sue, Victor's girlfriend and Reed's ex, has apparently went back to Reed. As time passes, Victor becomes obsessed with gaining revenge against the Fantastic 4 and his former investors who have betrayed him. His powers continue to get stronger, and his body is beginning to turn metallic in color.Reed has begun work on a machine that will reverse the effects of the cosmic cloud and restore everyone's DNA back to normal. However, he is encountering problems, and Ben is losing his patience. Using Ben's weakness as a possible way to get back at the Fantastic 4, Victor tells Ben that he has already completed his own machine. Intrigued, Ben allows Victor to try to reverse his effects. Will Victor's machine work? Will Victor destroy the Fantastic 4?I thought this was a great movie. The story is well conceived and the plot is great. Jessica Alba, Ioan Gruffudd, Chris Evans, Michael Chiklis, and Julian McMahon are terrific in their roles, and the special effects are out of this world. I wasn't sure how good this movie would be due to some of the poor reviews it received, but after watching it, I rate it very highly. If you're a fan of comics and superheroes, this movie is a must. I give this movie my highest recommendation. It is truly "fantastic".

okay

Usually, I'm "Mr. Instant Gratification", buying a DVD of the movies that I like asap. BUT, I've come to anticipate that these studios love to make you buy the disks over and over. Well, I usually get the first version and ignore the rest. Spider-man 2.1? Sorry, not getting my money a second time for a few extra minutes. But F.F. 1? That's a special case. Fearing that people might think that they're ripping off the Incredibles, they cut some footage out of the Fantastic Four. Unfortunate, considering the F.F. predate the Incredibles by over four decades. Be that as it may, I've waited two years for this extra material, including the Kirby doc, etc. This movie was very good and they treated the characters of the F.F. very true to form. the only problem lies with those of us comic fans who know so much about the F.F., that we have trouble accepting the changes in Doc Doom for one thing. The fans get ticked about the total change in Doom's origin and powers. The non-fans don't care and enjoyed him. Tells you something, doesn't it? The hardcore fans usually don't like Sue here because she's not portrayed as the professional hostage or the soccer mom as she is now in the comics. As usual, some of these folks have to open up their mind a bit. This is a younger, single Sue and Alba does a great job. They all do. In fact, I don't think I've ever enjoyed Johnny Storm as much in any incarnation as I did in this film. The interplay between him and Ben is excellent. Speaking of Ben, there's also been a lot of complaints about Ben's 'lack of rockiness'. Well, again, this is in the beginning of their careers when Ben WASn'T as rocky. In the trailer for the second film, they've actually made him rockier and he looks even better. As a die hard F.F. fan for the last 30+ years, I initially had to get around some elements that conflicted with the comic book past as well but I did and after seeing it with more of an open mind on HBO awhile back, I enjoyed Doom a lot more, letting this version stand on it's own merits. Once again, they chan ged his origin so he didn't seem like Darth Vader--a man in a suit of armor--while in reality, Lucas (biggest hack of them all) based Vader on Doom in the first place. Not that any star Wars fan would accept that. In any case, can't recommend this movie highly enough and especially can't wait for F.F. 2.

I won't get bogged down with all the talk about the Fantastic 4 movie not hitting the mark in terms of the original comic books. Stan Lee was involved in the making so any artistic liberties that he is happy with are ok with me.The Story tells of the formation of the Fantastic Four and the Evil Dr Doom, all of whom develop genetic modifications to there DNA, as the result of a freak storm in space that they had gone out to invesigate and perform experiments in, arrives early and catches the four unaware. The resultant storm gives each of the four there super powers. Stretchy, Invislbity, Fire and "The Thing" who is super strong and tough as his body has become stone! What the 4 don't intially realise is that the Victor Doom who was on the station also, and footing the bill for all this out of space experimentation, is also affected by the storm, and as his mutli billion dollar empire starts to crumble his evil persona start to take root.So lets look at the Blu Ray and what you get.Picture quality is very good with lots of the usual shiny effects and dazzling images. The sound is excellent quality too though as seems to be a constant gripe with me and blu rays the extras are noted by there abscence! This is rather annoying and I know adopt my own Blu-Ray mantra which is "Standard Definition Extra's are better than none!" Please Please Please Blu-Ray makers head my plea!!!Over all a good romp and although quite camp acting its well within the characters of the film. What else would you expect from a hero whos tag line is "Its Clobbering time" :) Enjoy:)

The trouble with Marvel is this should have 4☆ and would back in the day. Now we have to compare with No Way Home and Dr Strange. Not to mention the likes of Loki.......and that's "just a TV show".Moving forward the ratings become 7 or 8 out of 5!!!!

So like an excited child I opened this box and saw one of my old favourites on Blu-ray. Upon turning the box over I realised I'd messed up... The back of the box was all in German. Yes German. This IS the English film and DOES HAVE the English audio and an ability to turn subtitles off so it plays as normal but my lord did I nearly cry when the menu, came up in German too. Make sure you check first before buying. All in all tho ignoring the minor issue just want to say thank you to the manufacturers for using the English film and adding the audio too otherwise I'd be snookered!

Doesn't take itself too seriously, easy to watch & enjoy if you don't expect too much. Decent addition to my marvel collection.

I just got it after watching the pretty awful remake which I thought was pretty terrible. All though this earlier version is dated a bit and perhaps not quite as polished style-wise,it's far superior than the reboot and a fun, coherent and enjoyable superhero movie.