The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen (2003)

              THE LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN
                (a film review by Mark R. Leeper)

     CAPSULE: An interesting premise from a graphic
     novel makes about half an hour of interesting
     story, mostly for the introduction of the
     characters.  But the film needed a good plot to
     make it more than just a comic book origin story.
     This one seems to have a plot that was patched
     together as it went along.  The film has a nice
     look, but the viewer is never intrigued by the
     villain or his machinations.  Rating: 4 (0 to 10),
     0 (-4 to +4)

Perhaps one of the most respected names of authors in the graphic novel medium is Alan Moore, creator or co-creator of WATCHMEN, V FOR VENDETTA, FROM HELL, and THE LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN. FROM HELL has already been filmed and now THE LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN has been filmed also.

Moore's intriguing premise is that several characters, not necessarily heroes, from popular late 19th Century British (or French) fiction all exist in the same universe and can be called upon by the British government to form a sort of Justice League of Britain. Included in this all-star team are H. Rider Haggard's Allan Quatermain, Jules Verne's Captain Nemo, H. G. Wells's Invisible Man, Robert Louis Stevenson's Jekyll/Hyde, and Bram Stoker's Mina Harker. The graphic novel turned them all into superheroes, modifying several of them from their original form intended by their creators. Nemo, decked out like a maharajah, has a Nautilus the size of an ocean liner. (Side note: In 20,000 LEAGUES UNDER THE SEA Jules Verne originally planned that Nemo would be a Polish engineer who had reason to hate Russians. Verne's editor removed this detail so the novel would sell better in Russia. In MYSTERIOUS ISLAND we find that Nemo is an Indian, Prince Dakar.) Stevenson's Jekyll and Hyde get crossed with the Incredible Hulk. Hyde is a hulk-monster. In the book, Hyde is a small man for whom even Jekyll's clothes are far too big. Not to mention that many of these people died in their original stories. The film takes even greater liberties. Along for the ride is Dorian Gray who can pass all his injuries on to his portrait but who dies if he sees the portrait. Mina Harker has become a vampire like Dracula, but uses her new powers for good rather than eeevil. Also joining the action is Tom Sawyer, now all grown up and a secret service agent.

While the story would have been better had Moore and co-author Kevin O'Neill restricted themselves to faithfully represent the characters from the stories, it is still a fairly clever premise to bring these characters together as a team. For that, if for no other reason, I was looking forward to the film version of THE LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN. Unfortunately, the film has to introduce this premise and that task takes no little time on the screen. It diverts time from telling the main story. With not much time to tell the story, LEAGUE is not the most interesting or engaging tale that it could be. It is a rushed story of a super- villain with a confusing and confused but nasty plot that endangers the whole world. The plot might be fit for a lesser James Bond effort, but even there it could be better amplified, better explained, and the character of the villain would be more fleshed out. In fact, the villain of this piece has a particular visual characteristic about him. He loses that characteristic late in the film and when he does he also loses most of his interest value. It becomes hard to pick him out of scenes. The viewer hardly knows or cares. This is not a memorable screen villain. Nor does it seem the writers started their script knowing what the villain's plot was.

Part of the pleasure of the film is supposed to be the anachronisms. But most of the fun is in the first part of the film and the anachronisms long outlast the fun. Having a fancy submarine in the 19th century is a good fun anachronism. Having it be the length of the Queen Mary we can nod at. (Though it does seem to change scale several times in the course of the film.) A little while later when we see Nemo also has an automobile that looks like a 1930s Hollywood roadster with fancy bric-a-brac added, we must turn a blind eye. Later when we hear someone making jokes about wanting to nail a woman, the anachronism is just there to make a really stupid and tasteless joke and has no humor value at all. It is the kind of joke that is a cue for the patrons to check their watches.

The film's strong suit then is not its plot but its visual effect. The production design is by Carol Spier, and she is very accomplished. She has been art director or production designer for several David Cronenberg films (including NAKED LUNCH and "eXistenZ"), MIMIC, DRACULA 2000, and BLADE II. These are all films with strong visual elements and it probably is no coincidence. LEAGUE has a nice Victorian "steam punk" look and a lot of nifty gadgets to look at.

It would be nice to see these literary characters brought together in some intriguing yarn. This story is not it. And the villain is just too much (dare I say it?) a comic book villain. I rate THE LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN a 4 on the 0 to 10 scale and a 0 on the -4 to +4 scale. [-mrl]

                                        Mark R. Leeper
                                        mleeper@optonline.net
                                        Copyright 2003 Mark R. Leeper

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X-RAMR-ID: 35311
X-Language: en
X-RT-ReviewID: 1177232
X-RT-TitleID: 1123784
X-RT-AuthorID: 1309
X-RT-RatingText: 4/10