Norrington and Robinson show glimmers of faith in Moore's vision -- that paranoia, suspicion and resentment as well as other major character flaws are more a part of the league's bond than fighting for queen and country. There's a visual tribute, too: the long, dark hair and beard on the Fantom make this bad guy look like photos of the lanky, vaguely frightening Moore. The addition of Dorian Gray, who doesn't appear in the comics, and a joke about Captain Nemo's first mate are in keeping with Moore's pillaging of British public-domain figures with a tattered history. (Not all are public-domain. The movie's see-through hero has to be called an invisible man, or risk a battle not even Quatermain could win: a copyright lawsuit.)
But Moore's League is a meditation on ambiguity, something large-scale-action spectacles have shied away from since The Empire Strikes Back, which came so long ago it now actually feels like a legend from Victorian England. Norrington's movie, which opens nationwide today, suffers from its own anxieties -- a dread of being too literate, if not too literary. That's an unintentionally hilarious failing, given the material's leaning on bookish figures -- in their way, the Marvel comics of their time. It's hard not to notice the connection between Hyde and the Hulk, and how much more impressive the visual effects are in rendering Jekyll's brutish alter ago than Bruce Banner's big green side. (It's here that Norrington's background as a conceptual artist presents itself.)
Connery's choice to portray Quatermain as unflaggingly stalwart displays a lack of nuance, killing off any hint of subtext. The closest he comes to fallibility is a weary cantankerousness that registers more like hostility than weakness. The crushing obviousness he exerts amounts to a misunderstanding of his power and his presence: he was also an executive producer.
Obviously, Tom Sawyer was added as a nod to young American audiences, and West is likably reckless.
Despite the intentions to be reverent, Norrington, who did a ruthlessly elegant job directing Blade, is bound and gagged by the need of League to be quick and glib. Somehow, you sense that Fox would be happier calling this picture The Justice League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. As it stands, the movie is neither gentle nor extraordinary. Gentlemen may be a better movie than other Connery fantasy-action films like The Avengers, but then again a glass of muddy water looks good to someone just coming in from the desert.
RSS