THE MIGHTY QUINN
A film review by Mark R. Leeper
Copyright 1989 Mark R. Leeper
Capsule review: Likable, boyish police chief on a
Caribbean resort island solves a murder involving a childhood
friend. Just an okay mystery story, this film has "TV pilot"
written all over it. Rating: low +1.
As they say in the song, "You've not seen nothing like THE MIGHTY QUINN. Resolving the double negative, it means you have seen something like THE MIGHTY QUINN and indeed you have. Ever since HAWAII FIVE-O, it has been common knowledge that television producers have wanted to set police films in pleasant climates. We've had CARIBE and MIAMI VICE actually make it to production. Though nobody has said it anywhere, my natural cynical suspicion is to believe that Jamaica is some producer's dream and THE MIGHTY QUINN is the pilot for a television series. The film has the unmistakable (or maybe only semi-mistakable) feel of a television pilot.
Our hero is a young, idealistic Chief of Police, Xavier Quinn (played by Denzel Washington). Born on a large Caribbean island, Quinn went to the United States to get his training from the FBI. He returned to the island to keep the peace driving an open jeep and wearing a conveniently photogenic uniform with short pants and short sleeves. His boyish charms are irresistible to women regardless of social status. Quinn has his problems dealing with the island governor, an ex-chicken inspector, whose chief concern is to keep a lid on things for the resort business. The governor is played by Norman Beaton, who looks a bit like the late Adolph Caesar but, without insulting Beaton, lacks Caesar's magnetic screen presence.
In this case Maubee, Quinn's boyhood friend, is suspected of being involved in the murder of a resort owner who has been found with his head cut off. Maubee is even more boyish and winning than is Quinn and he seems to be magical to boot. Maubee is very disappointingly played by Robert Townsend (of HOLLYWOOD SHUFFLE). Townsend has a bad habit of grinning at the camera that director Carl Schenkel should have curbed but did not. This is one of those films when you are never more than ten minutes from a break in the action for the next song (in this case, reggae).
Lest you think that this is an actively bad film, the basic story is okay as a mystery--not great, but not all that bad either, though the villain is perhaps a bit predictable. M.~Emmet Walsh and Esther Rolle are present and are always assets. (Though having just seen Rolle in PBS's superior production of A RAISIN IN THE SUN, I find her performance here and this whole film tepid by comparison. You want a recommendation? See A RAISIN IN THE SUN.) Other assets of THE MIGHTY QUINN include some likable interaction between Quinn and his young son, and the fact that the movie does not become a real action film, at least not until the last few minutes and then only half-heartedly. There are at least a couple of in-jokes, one a reference to GUESS WHO'S COMING TO DINNER? and another a visual reference to DR. NO. I'd rate THE MIGHTY QUINN an ambivalent low +1 on the -4 to +4 scale.
Mark R. Leeper
att!mtgzz!leeper
leeper@mtgzz.att.com
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