The Black Hole (1979): written by Jeb Rosebrook, Bob Barbash, Richard H. Landau, and Gerry Day; directed by Gary Nelson; starring Maximilian Schell (Dr. Reinhart), Anthony Perkins (Dr. Durant), Robert Forster (Captain Holland), Joseph Bottoms (Lt. Pizer), Yvette Mimieux (Dr. McCrae), Ernest Borgnine (Harry Booth), Roddy McDowall (Voice of V.I.N.C.E.N.T.), and Slim Pickens (Voice of B.O.B.):
The Black Hole (1979) was Disney's $20 million reply to Star Wars. In the 22nd century, the Earth exploration ship stumbles across the giant Cygnus, an Earth vessel missing and presumed destroyed for 20 years. The Cygnus orbits the massive black hole that gives the movie its title.
Not as bad as I remember. You can tell how out of touch 1979 Disney was, though, by the fact that the movie mostly emulates two 1950's sci-fi epics, their own 20,000 Leagues under the Sea and Forbidden Planet, rather than, you know, Star Wars. Except for the cute robots voiced by Roddy McDowell and Slim Pickens. Their big eyes and squat shape makes them look like South Park's Eric Cartman. How's that for a distraction?
Well, and the final 10 minutes turn into a weird Christian allegory version of the trippy visuals sequence at the end of 2001. So to emulate the success of Star Wars, the people at Disney cobbled together a movie from two 1950's sci-fi epics and a Stanley Kubrick movie. This helps to explain why people in the film industry thought Disney had become increasingly out-of-touch with its audience since Walt died in the mid-1960's.
Nonetheless, the visual effects are very good. And the score by John Barry is so good that I realized I'd been humming portions of it for 39 years without remembering the source.
But the best thing is that Ernest Borgnine plays a shifty reporter. Why an expedition of four people and an annoying robot also needs Ernest Borgnine along... your guess is as good as mine.
Maximilian Schell chews the scenery as Professor Morbius... um, Captain Nemo... um, Dr. Reinhart! Anthony Perkins is suitably squirmy as an easily dazzled scientist. Robert Forster as the Captain of the Palamino and Yvette Mimieux and Joseph Bottoms as the other crew members... well, they showed up and they got paid. There's not a lot for them to do. Lightly recommended.
20 000 Leagues Under the Sea (1954): adapted from the Jules Verne novel by Earl Felton; directed by Richard Fleischer; starring James Mason (Captain Nemo), Kirk Douglas (Ned Land), Paul Lukas (Professor Aronnax), and Peter Lorre (Conseil) : Jesus Christ but does Kirk Douglas ever get out-acted by a trained seal in this movie. Douglas is both terrible and miscast as harpooner Ned Land, a character one wishes would just die. He's the angry, stupid American. James Mason, Paul Lukas, and Peter Lorre seem to be acting in a different movie.
The biggest-budget, live-action Walt Disney film to hit the screen in the 1950's (and for at least a decade afterwards), 20 000 Leagues Under the Sea remains involving despite its occasionally torpid pace and that godawful performance by Kirk Douglas. The design of Nemo's Victorian-era super-submarine, the Nautilus, is superb and steampunky. James Mason as Nemo, Paul Lukas as Professor Aronax, and Peter Lorre as Conseil are all solid in their roles. And the squid fight still works, with the mechanical effects making the squid seem as unearthly as the tornado in The Wizard of Oz.
Made now, 20 000 Leagues Under the Sea would play Nemo as even more of a hero -- he's attacking the slave trade, after all, having been enslaved himself in some South Seas mining colony. Of course, Nemo was a native of India in the original novel. James Mason, not so much. The often languid pace can get a bit wearing at times, as does Kirk Douglas, but 20 000 Leagues Under the Sea still works for the most part. Recommended.
How To Train Your Dragon 2 (2014): based on the books by Cressida Cowell; written and directed by Dean DeBlois; starring the voices of Jay Baruchel (Hiccup), Cate Blanchett (Valka), Gerard Butler (Stoick), Craig Ferguson (Gobber), America Ferrara (Astrid), Jonah Hill (Notlout), and Djimon Honsou (Drago) : How To Train Your Dragon was a lot of fun. So too this sequel, though its frenetic pace and much longer action sequences make it a far less charming movie than the original. Still worth watching, though, for the animation, voice acting, and story. The designs of the seemingly endless number of different dragon species remain a highlight. Recommended.
Run Fatboy Run (2007): written by Michael Ian Black and Simon Pegg; directed by David Schwimmer; starring Simon Pegg (Dennis), Thandie Newton (Libby), Hank Azaria (Whit), Dylan Moran (Gordon), and Harish Patel (Mr. Goshdashtidar) : Fun, amiable comedy takes full advantage of the good will Simon Pegg generates when playing hapless heroes. Hank Azaria seems like an odd choice as the handsome boyfriend, but he does a good job. Thandie Newton is lovely but stuck with being a straight woman to pretty much everyone else in the movie. Recommended.
Poltergeist (2015): adapted by David Lindsay-Apaire from the 1982 movie written by Steven Spielberg, Michael Grais, and Mark Victor; directed by Gil Kenan; starring Sam Rockwell (Eric Bowen), Rosemarie DeWitt (Amy Bowen), Saxon Sharbino (Kendra Bowen), Kyle Catlett (Griffin Bowen), Kennedi Clements (Madison Bowen), Jared Harris (Carrigan Burke), and Jane Adams (Dr. Brooke Powell): It's probably a much better-acted film than the original, this Poltergeist remake. Sam Rockwell certainly does everything he can with his role, which actually seems to be modeled on the father in The Amityville Horror rather than Poltergeist (1982): financial woes occupy him.
The kids are much more front and centre here. The scares are pretty light. Perhaps most notably, the Tree and Clown scenes have been completely bungled. It also doesn't help that the gateway to the Underworld looks and acts like a Stargate, or that occult investigator Jared Harris is dressed like a leprechaun. It's a diversion, but just barely. Lightly recommended.
