I don’t care about the other reviewers, I actually enjoyed this. It was fairly well-drawn, it was fun, it was fast-moving, it was not overlong. And nobody sang any songs.

Plot: Proteus (Joseph Fiennes), son of King Deimos of Syracuse, is escorting the magical Book of Peace (which protects the Twelve Cities) to Syracuse when he encounters his childhood buddy Sinbad (who, perhaps because of 9/11, seems to have become Greek rather than Arab) who is out to steal the book. Sinbad (Brad Pitt) fails (or gets sidetracked), but later Eris (Michelle Pfeiffer), Goddess of Discord (and patroness of the Discordians, though the movie does not mention this), swipes the book and lays the blame on Sinbad. Proteus, who has faith in Sinbad, offers to take Sinbad’s place in durance vile (and, later, on the chopping block) so that Sinbad can sail off to Tartarus and recover the book; Proteus’s fiancee, Marina (Catherine Zeta-Jones … sigh), goes along to ensure Sinbad’s good behavior. After sailing through the Dragon’s Rocks (Scylla and Charybdis, I think), complete with Sirens … trying to harvest tree sap on the back of a giant anglerfish … and fighting a rather hyperboreal-looking roc, Sinbad and Marina finally make it to Tartarus, where Sinbad has to decide whether he is going to be a good guy or a bad guy.

One minor problem, not unique to this film. When Dennis Haysbert (here the voice of Kale) walks onto the set in a live-action film, it’s pretty obvious that he’s black, though that fact may not be relevant to the plot of the film; e.g., his Dr. Morris in the (unfortunately short-lived) TV series Now and Again could have been any color of the rainbow — the part would have been the same. When he provides the voice for a cartoon character his skin color is no longer even apparent — so why does his cartoon character have to be black? Why couldn’t Kale’s voice have been that of a white actor? Why couldn’t Haysbert have done Sinbad (Dr. Morris, with just a bit of exasperation, would have been great in that part)? Howcum they had to hire two Chinese guys to do the voices of the two Chinese brothers in Sinbad’s crew? Simply put, this does not make a lot of sense to me. ⁽¹⁾

That minor bit of carping aside, again, this was an enjoyable film.

---

⁽¹⁾ The relevance of an actor’s race in the movies, from the standpoint of plot, has really been minimal for a long, long time — I remember seeing a circus film (name happily forgotten) back in the fifties, in which Chinese-American actress Nancy Kwan played an Italian trapeze artist. Nobody seemed to care or notice. Unfortunately, this fact doesn’t seem to be trickling up to those who make the casting decisions very quickly. Don Harlow, July 3, 2003 02:59 PM

Name:


Your e-mail will not be shared or displayed:


URL:


Remember personal info?
Yes No

Comments: