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RV Travel Log |
Addendum to Southern Indiana, Kinda nice (but mostly movie notes) - 08/11/2003
"League of Extraordinary Gentlemen" is worth $1.50 (It's odd how that price keeps coming up in these travelogues). What is a very cool premise and some pretty decent acting is completely destroyed by some of the worst writing I have ever heard. It's as if the screenwriters are constantly trying to remind us that these are literary characters. Example: Captain Nemo's first mate, the only european on an Indian ship, is Ishmael of Moby Dick fame. In case we had any hopes of his presence being subtle, his first line is the same as his book: "Call me Ishmael."
Worse Example: Alan Quartermain (Sean Connery) returns to England to join the League and this dialogue occurs: "Well you got here quickly" (Quartermain folds up his newspaper and collapses his umbrella) "Not as fast as Phineas Fogg! Around the world in eighty days?" (grunts)
While some people might not be bothered by this gratuitous use of literature, at the end of teh movie it was my chief complaint.
Second and far more lasting were the subplots. In all but one case, it feels as if the writers are setting themselves up for a sequel. Mina Harker (Peta Wilson doing a killer Lady Dracula impression) and Dr. Jekyll exchange some glances, but no romance. Yet. Captain Nemo acts strange and we glimpse his creepy idol of Kali, Goddess of Time and Destruction, but nothing comes of it. Yet. At the very end, we see a witch doctor chanting over a grave which trembles, but nothing pops out. Yet. The obvious problem is, if you make the movie bad by depending on the sequel, no sequel will come. The only subplot that plays out is maudlin and boring -- Quartermain grieving for his son and considering his own demise. Young Tom Sawyer (of the CIA, I kid you not) is in need of a father figure.
zzzzzzzzzzz...
I'm much more interested in Addendum to tall Ships 2003
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