[Note: It's a pity this didn't get released a week or so earlier--it could have been r.a.m.r. #1492! As it is, it will have to settle for 1506, the year of Columbus's death. -Moderator]
CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS--THE DISCOVERY
A film review by Peter Reiher
Copyright 1992 Peter Reiher
Those familiar with the Salkind brothers had good reason to doubt the quality of their Christopher Columbus film, CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS - The DISCOVERY. Their last few ventures have hardly inspired much confidence. However, in the past they delivered not only SUPERMAN, but also THE THREE MUSKETEERS and THE FOUR MUSKETEERS. While far from a perfect film, CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS--THE DISCOVERY bears more resemblance to the Salkind's earlier successes than to their more recent failures.
CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS--THE DISCOVERY covers Columbus' attempts to convince someone to finance his journey, and his first voyage. The Salkind's decided to ignore his increasingly desperate later attempts to prove that he had reached the Far East in favor of the great triumph of his initial discoveries. That decision is symptomatic of the entire approach of the film. While not entirely hagiographic, CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS--THE DISCOVERY is basically an adventure film about a great man who performs a great deed despite determined opposition and tremendous odds. Taken purely as such, the film is basically a success. If one wants a more studied, intellectual approach to Columbus, perhaps Ridley Scott's upcoming version will provide satisfaction. If one is just interested in a good time at the movies, the Salkind version does just fine.
CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS--THE DISCOVERY is a very handsome film. No expense has been spared to make the film look good. The set design, the costumes, and the photography are all impeccable. Given the film's budget, and the past history of the Salkind's, that's not too surprising. Much more surprising is that moderate amounts of effort have been spent on the script and the direction. Mario Puzo, a Salkind favorite after SUPERMAN, wrote the story, and receives a partial screenplay credit. John Wiley and Cary Bates get the first credit on the screenplay. (They apparently wrote most of what got shot.) They have created a reasonably paced, reasonably intelligent version of the story. Perhaps the script's biggest flaw is that it does not provide sufficient depth to its central character, at least in the first hour of the film. Eventually, Columbus is revealed to be more than a visionary standing heroically in the prow of his ship, but we aren't given quite enough preparation for the darker side of the man, which emerges rather suddenly.
Despite this flaw, and a perfunctory love interest, and some silly lines, and a tendency to make nods in the direction of fashionable views of history, the script is a success, on the whole. Even some of the politically correct touches are made to work. As the Santa Maria pulls away from Spain on its voyage, revealed behind it is a ship full of Jews who are about to be deported from Spain. The moment was carefully prepared, the shot was well planned, so it achieves its effect.
This shot, and some others, show that the director, John Glen, had a bit more than hackwork in mind. Glen graduated from being a second unit director of James Bond films to being the director, and has done the last four or five of them. However, he's done little else, and has gained a reputation as an action specialist. The few action scenes in this film show he hasn't lost his touch for staging violence, but he gets a chance to show a bit more breadth of talent. He has real characters who get to speak real dialog to each other in this film, and he handles it pretty well. He also does nicely with the big moments of the film.
His handling of the actors is another strong point. There is only one truly weak performance in CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS--THE DISCOVERY, and it, fortunately, is in a supporting role. The leads do quite well. George Corraface is not well known to film audiences, but he has a strong theatrical background, and was to play the lead in David Lean's NOSTROMO. He provides a good, solid Columbus, here. He does the best he can to mask the lack of early development of his character, so that Columbus' nastier side does not come completely out of the blue. But he also manages to convey a sense of true heroism, as the success of the film definitely required.
Marlon Brando, unjustly given top billing in a supporting role, almost manages to justify it. His is a superb performance, as Torquemada, the Grand Inquisitor and confessor to Queen Isabella. He subtly underplays the part (not the type of acting choice Brando has made for many years), and makes us wish that there were more scenes like the one where he interrogates Columbus about the possibly heretical aspects of the planned voyage. Corraface manages not to disappear entirely in his scenes with Brando, but Brando confirms that he still has the talent, when he chooses to show it. It's an interesting choice of the screenwriters to deliver a moral judgement on Columbus from Torquemada's lips, and Brando manages to pull it off, in part because of the sincerity of faith he has brought to the character earlier. It would be easy to play Torquemada as a sadistic, slavering villain, but Brando's subtlety pays far greater dividends.
The other major parts are Rachel Ward, as Queen Isabella (adequate); Tom Selleck, as King Ferdinand (relatively speaking, a triumph over unlikely casting - Selleck owes his costume maker a good deal for the success of his performance, but he does bring it off); and Robert Davi, as Pinzon, one of the captains of the small fleet and an ambiguous character, part hero, part opportunist. Davi doesn't quite succeed in the slightly underwritten part, but doesn't fail utterly, either.
Given the limited ambition and goals of CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS--THE DISCOVERY, the film is just about as good as it could have been. It's nice to look at, not entirely devoid of intelligence, pretty consistently entertaining, and generally well acted. Its poor advertising campaign and the mysterious decision by the releasing studio not to pre-screen it for critics almost certainly doom it to failure at the box office, but it really is worth seeking out before it disappears, for those who have any interest in historical epics, at all.
--
Peter Reiher
reiher@wells.cs.ucla.edu
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