Dick Tracy (1990) vs. The Crow (1994)

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Both are comic book movies that are style of substance in the sense that it relies more on the look and atmosphere of the movie to sell it. Which is good, nothing wrong with that. Both stories aren't anything to write home about.

Dick Tracy has a better plot in the sense, that it's not repetitive like The Crow, which follows the revenge formula, where the main character wants revenge on a group of villains, and then he kills one, then another, then another, and it becomes repetitive and that's the whole movie... Where as you could argue that Dick Tracy has more intricate plot turns rather than following a formula perhaps.

But as far as the comic book looks go, they are both really good and both top notch, which is why I couldn't help to compare them. What do you think?



Abashed the Devil stood and felt how awful Dick Tracy is.



Well, one is very colorful and one is very dark.

For some reason I was never able to get into the Dick Tracy movie. While I admire the cameos, the make-up and the concept (with sets & colors) it just never grabbed me. Maybe it was Beatty in the lead and Madonna - never been a big fan of either.

While the Crow (although I don't care for comic-based movies with a supernatural twist - more of a sci-fi fan myself) engaged me right away and throughout. Violent, brutal, yet poignant - a great "revenge" film.



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Oh okay. Did the whole get revenge on one villain at a time, throughout the entire movie, slightly bother anyone with The Crow, or was it just me? I guess I just found it formulaic for a dark movie, but still a dark movie, nonetheless.



Oh okay. Did the whole get revenge on one villain at a time, throughout the entire movie, slightly bother anyone with The Crow, or was it just me? I guess I just found it formulaic for a dark movie, but still a dark movie, nonetheless.
Didn't bother me - when you're out to avenge the murder of your girlfriend you tend to go after the killers one at a time (a normal person would anyway, as opposed to taking on a whole gang at once, just for practical reasons - it would be easier that way without running the risk of being overwhelmed by numbers yourself).

Of course, with the Crow's powers he could have taken them all down at once - but that would make for a much shorter, less satisfying movie.

Plus, revenge is better when it can be savored with each victim as opposed to say just blowing them all up with a bomb or something.



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Oh okay, I just feel that the whole get revenge on the killers one at a time, had been done to death, and that more intricate plot with more twists and turns and surprises may have been better, rather than your basic formula revenge plot, or so I thought.



I'd say The Crow is probably one of my favorite comic-based movies... and some of that may be due to the fact that I never read the comic so I didn't have any source material to compare it to.

Don't know if the real-life tragedy added to the film's mystique, but I still would've liked it, perhaps even more if Brandon had lived (there's always a tinge of real sadness while watching it due to what happened behind the scenes).

I never cared for any of the sequels which I think also would have been different if Brandon lived to star in them.



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Oh okay. There was a youtube video where they did a movie vs. comic comparison, and it seemed that the movie may have improved on some things by changing them around, but it's hard to know without reading the comic book.



That elusive hide-and-seek cow is at it again
When did you watch The Crow to make this comparison? I mean theatrical release had a different context than say catching it on basic cable two years ago.



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I originally saw it on TV in 1998 I believe. I've seen it on DVD over the years since then, and it's the same version or so it seems.



That elusive hide-and-seek cow is at it again
Yeah, I don't mean to suggest it's a different movie or anything. Just that in comparing two movies watched recently, outside of the context of their original releases, they likely won't have the same impact.

It's a strange comparison to me. One was more family-friendly while the other was clearly not. Different audience, different objectives. Like Jaws vs Finding Nemo. Both are about fish.

I prefer The Crow far and away more than Dick Tracy. While I respected what DT was at the time, it is a cartoon. Where, like what captain wrote, The Crow was more of a science fiction movie with weird poetic ideals of love and heart break.

A better comparison for DT might be in Who Framed Roger Rabbit. Both were detective stories. Both were heavily grounded in more cartoon-like worlds, and, though there was violence, both were approachable by the whole family.



The trick is not minding
Haven’t seen Dick Tracy yet, but I love The Crow. I remember seeing it in theatres and just rewatched it again a few years ago.
I thought it was well done for a revenge thriller. Very stylish.



Movie Forums Squirrel Jumper
Yeah, I don't mean to suggest it's a different movie or anything. Just that in comparing two movies watched recently, outside of the context of their original releases, they likely won't have the same impact.

It's a strange comparison to me. One was more family-friendly while the other was clearly not. Different audience, different objectives. Like Jaws vs Finding Nemo. Both are about fish.

I prefer The Crow far and away more than Dick Tracy. While I respected what DT was at the time, it is a cartoon. Where, like what captain wrote, The Crow was more of a science fiction movie with weird poetic ideals of love and heart break.

A better comparison for DT might be in Who Framed Roger Rabbit. Both were detective stories. Both were heavily grounded in more cartoon-like worlds, and, though there was violence, both were approachable by the whole family.
Oh I see what you mean. Well I saw Dick Tracy recently, and The Crow not too long ago. The thing that made me compare the two, is they are two of the best movies to present a comic book universe and look I think. But I wasn't just comparing the production designs, but also the movies as a whole.

I would say Who Framed Roger Rabbit is much more of a cartoon compared to Dick Tracy though, since it has actual cartoon characters in it by comparison of course.



I've told this story before (so forgive me) but after seeing Roger Rabbit in 1988, I ran into a friend's parents - they were intellectuals (in fact they used to take me and their son to see art movies at Princeton University when we were just pre-teenagers!)

We got to talking and they asked if I'd seen any good movies so I told them Roger Rabbit blew me away.

They were like, "What? You went to see THAT? And it 'blew you away'? Really?"
I told them I thought it was genius.
They said, "It's a CARTOON! It's for children!"

And I argued, "But the whole concept - the golden age of Hollywood, mixing in a noir-style detective story with cartoons, the cartoons being celebrities living alongside real people, all the different properties formerly protected by copyrights coming together in a shared universe - I used to fantasize about this when I was little - now to see it on screen - nothing like this has really been done before!"

Their mouths just hung open and they said, "They've been mixing animation with live-action for decades! Didn't you ever see Mary Poppins?"

I totally went down a notch in their intellectual view for having defended Roger Rabbit as something unique and worth seeing!



Box-Fanned & Consoled Nobility
I've never seen either of them but I have seen 9 1/2 Weeks (1986) [I observed it a few days ago] with the lead actress [I don't remember her name] from the first movie mentioned and is a pretty good movie..
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That elusive hide-and-seek cow is at it again
I've never seen 9 1/2 Weeks, but I did eat Chicken Korma for lunch just now.
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The crow is really good, same cannot be said, about the crow: city of angels



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Am I the only one who can't help but kind of like The Crow: City of Angels? I mostly like it for the technical aspects, such as the sets and cinematography, rather than the story, but I thought that was the reason people like the first Crow as well, more for the sets and cinematography?