The Avengers Forever: The Movie

	The Movie: Non-Fans Page 3 of 3

Visitors vent on the movie

I will definitely recommend this site to my friend in Seattle... I warned him not to see [the movie] in the absolutely strongest terms I could use (and as a cop, I can use some pretty strong terms) and he still spent good money on it. Best friends for 40 years and this almost wrecked it. Why he holds it against me, I still can't figure. Maybe the temporary blindness and dementia had something to do with it. Oh well. — Anon

I waited for the "Avengers" movie with considerable anticipation and watched it with infuriated disappointment. I wasn't expecting Macnee and Rigg or even Gareth Hunt... but the film lacked style, wit and plot and, worse yet, it substituted a leer for the fondly remembered twinkle in the eye of the old series. To echo a comment previously made about Norman Mailer, I cannot say that all who were involved with this epic WERE drunk; I can only HOPE that they were... As a tailpiece to the above commentary, I should say that I have nothing intrinsically against remakes of old television shows, although I suspect that it may bespeak an industry sadly bereft of imagination. I did enjoy "The Fugitive" and some other remakes, notably "Lost In Space", which was far superior to what was, all in all, a pretty terrible show, even for the intended audience of children. — David Marohl

By the way, what the hell was with that Avengers Movie??? It was terrible. I guess it is just another way to cash in on the 60's. — Steven Macaulay

The Avengers and the Prisoner were two shows I grew up with. Think they show that TV can hit the high notes... New Avengers are a bit weak. However, that has all been overshadowed by the movie. What a great franchise that could have been. A juicy movie every few years would have been great. This was right in there with Mission Impossible. Total mess. — Mark Simons

A few comments about the dreadful "Avengers" movie. I'll start with one good thing to say. That is, the release of the film may have encouraged the A&E home video reissues we've been enjoying. It's very difficult to match the tone of the original even under the best of circumstances. That goes for most any series that has been "adapted" for the cinema. Making matters worse is that these adaptations are not done in the spirit of homage to a fond memory but as a simple product. Get some sets and costumes together that look like the original & let nostalgia provide a paying audience. The one time I have ever seen a TV adaptation capture the spirit of the original was in the "X-Files" movies last summer. Obviously in that case, the same creators were merely expanding on an ongoing cult program into big screen scale. As for the movie "Avengers" in particular, there wasn't much wrong with the basic premise: megalomaniac out to control the weather; send in the Avengers to stop him. But just about everything else went wrong, as David detailed in his half-bowler review. The story didn't even follow through on its own feeble terms. Judging from the brief running time, several minutes explaining certain key elements may well have been trimmed. It certainly would be consistent with the general carelessness of the project. Ralph Fiennes is a terrific actor but that doesn't mean he can play any part. Patrick Macnee was inimitable as John Steed, more so than Sean Connery's James Bond (as for Mr. Connery's contribution to this film, the less said the better). Fiennes as Steed was about as wrong-headed as William Hurt in "Lost in Space." Uma Thurman can project her obvious intelligence — necessary for Emma Peel — but she lacks the equally requisite playful charm of Diana Rigg. Once again, it's hard to get this kind of thing right. After this miserable experience, I'm leery of next summer's "Wild, Wild West" (another childhood favorite of mine). There's a fine line between wit and unfunny camp. They blew it before when "The Wild, Wild West" was updated in a couple of early 80's TV movies & I fear they'll do it again, good cast or not. Have any of you ever seen the 1967 James Bond spoof "Casino Royale" featuring David Niven, Peter Sellers, Woody Allen and Orson Welles? The Avengers movie aimed for the Emma Peel season and actually ended up replicating the spirit of "Casino Royale." To wit: overblown, overproduced, and badly written. But I did enjoy those mechanical bees... — Geoff Feller

I did take a Sunday afternoon to see the Avengers movie for myself and was disappointed. I understand it took a bath—primarily because so many of the first week audience kept saying that Ralph Fiennes and Uma Thurman were so unlike Patrick Macnee and Diana Rigg. That's why I have a feeling Hollywood will try another more effective film project someday. — John Gizzi

After reading WB's pages on The Avengers movie, I've arrived at a theory! Much of the notes Weintraub et al are saying, regarding the concepts they considered when making the movie, are - how does one say it? - quite culturally different from those picked up by "us over here". One example - they place great truck on the "are Steed and Emma 'at it'?" question, which doesn't really concern most English fans of the series I've spoken too. We seem more taken by the plots and the characters, and the "tea & biscuits" portrait of upper middle class England the show provides, rather than any relationships that may or may not be occurring. Another thing that concerns me is the manner in which Steed and Emma are portrayed as characters. To put it bluntly, they are COLD. Only in the pre-Peel series did we ever see Steed being so "professional," and even then, he did so with a twinkle. In which Emma or Tara episodes do we not see our heroes & heroines smile and banter in the face of danger? It is almost as if the actors, particularly Uma Thurman, were given the directive to "be English", taking on board any of the pre-conceived stereotypes they may have possessed under that label. Now, I quite like the movie, although I don't feel that it portrays The Avengers from my own particular preferences. "Good movie, bad remake." — Ian R Malcomson