The Avengers Review
by KRETSCHMAR Peter (pkretsch AT scsun DOT unige DOT ch)September 4th, 1998
Mini Review: "The Avengers"
Director: Jeremiah S. Chechik
Cast: Ralph Fiennes (John Steed)
Uma Thurman (Emma Peel)
Sean Connery (Sir August de Wynter)
Patrick Macnee (Invisible Jones)
and others
We saw this movie on a pre-release screening at the Open Air Cinema Cinelac in Geneva in the original version with french and german
subtitles.
For any who might not know, the movie builds on a rather succesful British TV series of the 60's. While I have a few fond memories of watching the series years later on German TV, I do not remember it well enough to state how close the movie is to the tone and style of the original series.
All in all we enjoyed the movie quite a bit, laughing often at some of the purposely over-the-top scenes and dialogue. Thinking too much about the movie later is prone to lead to some disappointment though as you realize the many possibilities to improve it.
Likes: Dislikes: ------------------------------ ------------------------------- * Style * Wasted actor talent, the * Tongue-in-cheek presentation characters are mostly paperthin * Interplay between lead couple * Bad plot holes and contrivances * Casting Sean Connery as bad guy * Weak storytelling, esp. at the end
I've read several bad reviews in the press and tend to think that they are caused by overly high expectations. With its stellar cast, The Avengers *could* have become a very good movie, but it isn't. On the other hand in my book it is still a fair movie, quite up to par in enjoyment value with many of the action flics one sees as mind candy from time to time.
Overall rating: +1 (Mark Leeper scale) for enjoyment, 0+ all in all.
-------------------------------------------------------------------- Peter Kretschmar [email protected] INTEGRAL Science Data Center phone: +41 22 950 91 46 Chemin d'Ecogia 16 fax: +41 22 950 91 33 CH-1290 Versoix
Switzerland http://obswww.unige.ch/isdc/ --------------------------------------------------------------------
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