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The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen
The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen is set at the turn of the 19th century and opens with a tank and a guided rocket. Yes, after just a few minutes the dodginess is at a pretty high level, and manages to maintain that state for the rest of the movie.
Based on a little known comic book, The League of Extraordinary Gentleman takes some well known literary characters and places them in a team designed to fight evil. Hmm, characters with superpowers band together to fight the evil overlord, that’s not clichéd at all, but fortunately, here at Dodgy Movies Reviewed, clichés are what we live for.
Now, all the characters in the movie are the correct age, based on the time periods the books are set in, with the exception of one, Tom Sawyer. Apparently, the American test audiences couldn’t identify with any of the non-American literary figures and the producers decided they needed a young American character and picked Tom Sawyer, not paying any attention to the integrity of the premise. Idiots.
Dodginess
The film has enough cool characters and special effects to warrant a 5 on the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man scale. Despite all this, the dodgiest moment has to be when the producers pandered to the viewing public and included Tom Sawyer. It wasn’t even like that change made the movie a blockbuster. They should have known better.
Rewatchability Rating
The action is good, but at times the one-liner nature of the dialogue can be a bit much to take. There is some great repartee, but most of it seems forced, and not even the Scottish accent of Sean Connery can make it sound any better. As a result, it only gets a 4 on the rewatchability index.
Most Memorable Quote
While a lot of the comments feel forced, one line stands out, more as a commentary on the American way of waging war than anything else. “Oh, I saw. Very American. Fire enough bullets and hope to hit the target.”
Final Thoughts
You may get the impression from reading the review that I didn’t enjoy The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, you’d be wrong. It’s definitely worth watching, you just might not watch it as often as some of the more classic dodgy movies, like evolution or dodgeball. Still, it would be a shame if you missed it.