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Movie musing
Mar. 28th, 2005 02:40 pmWatched 'The Shadow' on DVD last night. Twice. Gotta say that it is, IMO, the best adaptation of superhero to film yet made. To my mind there are some very good adaptations:
Billy Zane in 'The Phantom' is -almost- as good;
'The Mask' had great music - and was again almost as good;
the first Chris Reeve 'Superman' was good;
and the first 'Batman' movie had a great look & I liked the acting for Nickleson's Joker and for Keaton's portrayal of _Bruce Wayne_;
But to me 'The Sahdow' beats them all. Decent acting and a very good cast, but there are just so many truly winning parts of the flick. Alec Baldwin plays a believable guy with exceptional powers who is tormented by inner demons. The female lead is not complete fluff and contributes to the film. The main characters are able to flirt in an adult fashion & the humor is geared for an adult audience [and not to 5 year olds]. The script does not condescend & expects the audience to be intelligent [& this is what probably doomed it]. It even had a good sountrack and excellent end title song.
And even after seeing it twice, I'm tempted to see it again.
But what I did see today [for the first time ever] was 'Queen of the Damned'. I have to say that ... it wasn't bad. It was a fairly good adaptation of not one, but -2- books [the first 2/3 is 'Vampire Lestat'; last 1/3 was 'Queen of the Damned]. Of course, half of 'Queen' was a rehash of 'Lestat' & more was filler that could be summed up as: 'meet loser vampire; get to know them for a chapter; have Akasha burn them to ashes' = repeated a LOT. The actor they had for Lestat was smarmy & looked good enough for the role & the music was ... better than expected. I'd been expecting ghastly - so I am pleased.
Billy Zane in 'The Phantom' is -almost- as good;
'The Mask' had great music - and was again almost as good;
the first Chris Reeve 'Superman' was good;
and the first 'Batman' movie had a great look & I liked the acting for Nickleson's Joker and for Keaton's portrayal of _Bruce Wayne_;
But to me 'The Sahdow' beats them all. Decent acting and a very good cast, but there are just so many truly winning parts of the flick. Alec Baldwin plays a believable guy with exceptional powers who is tormented by inner demons. The female lead is not complete fluff and contributes to the film. The main characters are able to flirt in an adult fashion & the humor is geared for an adult audience [and not to 5 year olds]. The script does not condescend & expects the audience to be intelligent [& this is what probably doomed it]. It even had a good sountrack and excellent end title song.
And even after seeing it twice, I'm tempted to see it again.
But what I did see today [for the first time ever] was 'Queen of the Damned'. I have to say that ... it wasn't bad. It was a fairly good adaptation of not one, but -2- books [the first 2/3 is 'Vampire Lestat'; last 1/3 was 'Queen of the Damned]. Of course, half of 'Queen' was a rehash of 'Lestat' & more was filler that could be summed up as: 'meet loser vampire; get to know them for a chapter; have Akasha burn them to ashes' = repeated a LOT. The actor they had for Lestat was smarmy & looked good enough for the role & the music was ... better than expected. I'd been expecting ghastly - so I am pleased.
