By Eric Giordmaina | Image property of Hallmark Entertainment
The Poseidon Adventure
The new Poseidon Adventure hit Australian
shores hard and fast last weekend with the TV networks building the tension
through out last week. Then the climactic beginning to what felt like was
going to be the adventure of the year had finally arrived.
The popcorn was out, the big gallon of Coca Cola was next to it. The remote
set in my hand, my finger positioned just above the volume button, ready
for anything I might miss.....Fifteen minutes later, after I threw the remote
at the TV, kicked my popcorn over, and cursed all that was good and holy
for casting Steve Guttenberg as the lead, I wiped my hands of watching anything
else on TV. My advice to you all is to rent TV series from your local video
store before committing hours of your life to something as fruitless as
The Poseidon Adventure.
The Poseidon ADventure
This is B Grade at its utmost best.....or worst.
I can't really figure out which. The original Poseidon Adventure
was exactly that - an adventure and was actually new and exciting (at the
time). This "new" version fails in both categories from the start. Relying
heavily on stereotypes and cliches, the characters could just as well have
had labels written on their foreheads.
Disgracefully, the stereotyping seeps its way into the story itself. Blatant racial profiling seems to be the best way the "sea marshal" on board (Adam Baldwin) uses to locate the terrorists. If you have a middle-Eastern or other "suspicious" sounding name, or your skin is the wrong colour, you probably don't want to take this boat ride.....
Turns out he's exactly right! And the people responsible for costume design, casting etc didn't make these terrorist characters just look evil, they bent over backwards to make sure they looked like pure evil.....Nice. Perhaps the director was concerned that the people of this earth are so dense, we would not put two and two together.
Of course, there are many films that have flawed characters who lack that something in various ways, but there's something about the condescending judgementalism in this film that detracts from the characters who display it.
The younger generation may get more out of this than anybody else, but I highly doubt it would be anything intellectual or morally justifiable.
The Poseidon Adventure comes to NBC November 20, 2005
The Poseidon Adventure
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