In Clayface, a hot dude sleeps with the wrong woman, gets his face cut up, and becomes a Batman villain–sans Batman. The third entry in the DCU following Superman and Supergirl, this R-rated body horror movie is smaller in scope and budget–only $40 million–and feels it. Far better than any of the Sony Spider-Man villain films and a rare mainstream comic book adaptation to have sex, nudity, and gore, Clayface unfortunately doesn’t pack the punch it is so desperately seeking.
I’m a big fan of the Clayface character, but primarily pulled from the 90s-era Batman Animated Series I watched growing up. That Clayface was a big blob of a monster who could transform into anything and create weapons with his fist. He was a force to be reckoned with.
Needless to say I was disappointed to discover that this iteration of Clayface, played well by Tom Rhys Harries, is not that creature (yet), and the one time he does make a weapon with his fists, it is only alluded to off screen via shadow.
Co-written by my man Mike Flanagan (Haunting of Hill House and the new Carrie series), Clayface is a full-on origin story. It dutifully progresses in a meaningful way, and yet it takes a long time for anything to really happen. And even then, the movie marches along at a consistent but unfulfilling pace, checking the boxes but not ramping up in any noticeable way. Stuff increasingly happens but the excitement level stays the same.
The issue with the DCU thus far appears to be a director issue. DCU President James Gunn directed Superman extremely well, but Supergirl and now Clayface feel like director-for-hire projects, neither terrible but neither inspiring either. Director James Watkin has the entertaining Speak No Evil remake and the creepy The Woman in Black to his name, but Clayface feels somewhat flat, erring on generic. For a movie written by Mike Flanagan (and Hussein Amini of Drive fame), most of the characters are underdeveloped. The villain is a run-of-the-mill gangster, the plot predictable.
All that to say: Clayface is serviceable but disappointing. While it could have worked as a standalone non-Batman body horror film, it often plays it safe, odd given there are some solidly gory moments. This is a movie that feels trapped between being a real horror-thriller and a studio-driven DCU entry, a production unwilling to lean into its potential, molded into something with some true nastiness.
Review by Erik Samdahl. Erik is a marketing and technology executive by day, avid movie lover by night. He is a member of the Seattle Film Critics Society.