PLUNKETT & MACLEANE
Reviewed by Harvey Karten, Ph.D. USA Pictures Director: Jake Scott Writer: Charles McKeown & Robert Wade & Neal Purvis Cast: Robert Carlyle, Jonny Lee Miller, Liv Tyler, Ken Stott, Alan Cumming, Michael Gambon
Westerns--or at least the conventional type involving stagecoach robberies--have been passe for quite a while now. Originally the domain of young, westerns were accorded adult status when Gary Cooper's stirring role in "High Noon" showed the advantages of presenting a well- developed character in a genuinely tense and uncontrived situation. A film like "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid" could always break through the passing of fashion, but remember that George Roy's masterwork featured the extraordinary star power of Paul Newman and Robert Redford, whose chemistry together was of a quintessence and because "Butch Cassidy" was not really a western but a serious character study sharpened by edgy dialogue which masqueraded as a cowboy movie. And oh what a song by Burt Bacharach!
Now Jake Scott, son of Ridley Scott and nephew of Tony Scott, moves to bring the westerns back and targets the youth audience in much the way of the horse operas of the forties and early fifties. There may be a coincidence here, but we cannot help thinking that he is following in the footsteps of his role models in styling the movie. Ridley, for example, began as a set designer and moved into his own production company, manufacturing razzle-dazzle TV commercials. Kid brother Tony followed a similar path, directing commercials before turning out his best-known hit, "Top Gun," an empty action movie with the look of a TV commercial--though he later turned on a youthful arthouse crowd with "True Romance."
Jake, like the two other directors in his family, puts grace and elan only into his design and costumes rather than into his plot, making "Plunkett & Macleane" a potential contender for the production design Oscar. His England of the mid-18th Century is part Dickens, part Merchant-Ivory, one which throws the rabble into high contrast with the bloated aristocrats of the time. Unfortunately for the film, the script--written by a committee of five with three getting the credit for this muddled writing--tells us virtually nothing about the ragged background of its title characters and presents the blue bloods as absurd, unbelievable caricatures. With the aristos portrayed in a campy manner and the highwaymen presented as seriously noble lowlifes (one with pretensions to the gentry), we don't know what to make of the array of personalities. Their juxtaposition just doesn't add up.
James Maclaine and Will Plunkett were real characters, interesting enough to have their careers and backgrounds re- created on the screen rather than bowdlerized and made contemporary with MTV editing, loud contemporary music, and an absurd ending that would have rung true had the scripters instead followed the actual bios of the men. The screenplay would have done better dramatize James Maclaine's background in Ireland, refusal to sit at a desk with the business his father left to him, and his trip to England where he failed as a businessman. After meeting a failed pharmacist, Will Plunkett, the two took to robbing individuals and coaches, showing personal differences in make-up. Maclaine did not have the heart for the criminal action while Plunkett plunged into the underground career with passion.
In the film, however, a less arresting difference in temperament is played up. Scott presents Macleane (Jonny Lee Miller) as a man determined to rise in class into high society while Plunkett (Robert Carlyle) maintains a contempt for the aristos, retains his raggedly threads, and plays the servant to his partner.
Cashing in on the affection of the young for vulgarity, Scott has Macleane meet Robert under offensive conditions as the more earthy Plunkett acts in jail to extricate the ruby he has swallowed to avoid detection by the police. They form a two- man squad and, as eager as Willie Sutton to go where the money is, they devise a scheme whereby Macleane would dress in the Armani outfits of the day while Plunkett would keep his Dickensian clothing and act as footman. As they move on to robbing and blasting stagecoaches--with Scott throwing in the finest special effects that look at all authentic with the firepower available in 1749--Macleane falls in love with the feisty, unconventional Lady Rebecca (Liv Tyler), who does not fit in with the rest of society, who is turned on by stagecoach robberies. Guessing the identity of the two men, she urges them on to one final bit of larceny--against her own coach.
Ken Stott turns in a winning role as the most evil of villains, a kind of police chief named Chance who operates in an almost anarchic England, where people got hanged for pickpocketing and where Chance and Lord Chief Justice Gibson (Michael Gambon) are put under increasing pressure by the prime minister to bring the two highwaymen to justice. Alan Cumming steals his scenes, as expected, playing the bi-sexual--actually by his own admission one who "swings every way"--who seems to have pierced eyebrows and who operates in his country apparently before the anti-homosexual laws that put Oscar Wilde in prison. While Robert Carlyle thankfully does not talk in Scottish and though Jonny Lee Miller has matinee-idol good looks, they are no Robert Redford and Paul Newman, their star power insufficient to save a film that substitutes one-liners for wit and humor, rock- video editing for continuity and silliness for romance.
Rated R. Running Time: 102 minutes. (C) 1999 Harvey Karten
The review above was posted to the
rec.arts.movies.reviews newsgroup (de.rec.film.kritiken for German reviews).
The Internet Movie Database accepts no responsibility for the contents of the
review and has no editorial control. Unless stated otherwise, the copyright
belongs to the author.
Please direct comments/criticisms of the review to relevant newsgroups.
Broken URLs inthe reviews are the responsibility of the author.
The formatting of the review is likely to differ from the original due
to ASCII to HTML conversion.
Related links: index of all rec.arts.movies.reviews reviews