“Poseidon” (or “Is it Really Different Upside Down?”)

I love the original “Poseidon Adventure.” I love Gene Hackman as the priest who leads the survivors to safety, I love the girl and her brother who are accidentally swept to salvation, I love the Shelley Winters valiantly doing her part to aid their little group. It’s a loaded cast… and a fun disaster movie.

The other thing I love about the original is the attention to detail of the filmmakers. They made a film about a boat that was upside down. Being upside down is an important part of the story. It’s hard to walk up the ceiling of a staircase. Its’ hard to figure out where you are when everything is upside down. The world is different and that, itself, is part of the adventure.

I realized what I loved about the original when I saw the new one!

“Poseidon” tries to load the cast with Kurt Russell, Josh Lucas (who is my new superstar crush next to Johnny), and Richard Dreyfuss. When you get a cast that can act, you have to give them good stuff to work with. Josh Lucas is a gambler who wants to get out… he doesn’t care about anyone else. He’s a pitiful replacement for Gene, and you wonder why he doesn’t just run away from his rag tag group.

Kurt Russell is an overprotective father who does have to find his daughter… his motivation for leaving the ball room. The others? NO good reason to hang out with Josh. And Josh doesn’t want them. Dreyfuss has the hardest role. He plays a older, gay man (is that a stretch for him?) whose lover has left him. He’s on deck, climbing over the railing to jump overboard when he sees the wall of water coming toward the ship. Evidently dying in a big wave is scarier than throwing yourself overboard, so he runs into the ballroom to tell people, and then spends the rest of the movie struggling to stay alive. Is he suicidal or not? Dunno.

And, there’s the whole upside-down and boat-on-fire thing. In the original, you see the characters struggling with the stairwells, and the upside down issues. I was always scared when they had to walk through the engine room and everything was so hot that one little stumble would result in life-threatening burns. Excellent.

The new one doesn’t make the obstacles as interesting. I kept forgetting that they were upside down because they move so easily through the ship. Of course Josh “knows ships” and that explains it. The explosions and fires don't make it too hot to do what they need to do. Kurt is a retired fireman (Josh is ex-Navy), so they've equipped characters with all the skills to make it “easy.”I liked the priest, the geek, the old people, and the girl and her brother all without skills and still trying. It’s dramatic.

So… not my favorite movie.

Having said all that, I watched the “Making of…” on HBO last night and realized a few things:

1. I would have liked this movie more if I hadn’t compared it to the old one. And, while some of that is my fault, I’m also blaming the screen writer who made the plot close enough that comparisons are inevitable. If he’d copied a bit less, I would have let go of my old notions.

2. The actors in the movie did almost all of their own stunts, and there isn’t a lot of CGI stuff. And THAT is cool. When I saw some of the scenes, I was pretty impressed with the enormity of the physical set and the way they actually flooded the ballroom with 100,000 gallons of water and stuff like that. So, it would be wrong to review it and not mention that it gets an A for technical merit and stunt stuff.

3. The director was conscious of the upside down stuff and actually talks about it. So, it wasn’t something they missed. Now, I think they wanted so many obstacles (and always bigger and better ones) around each corner that they overdid it. The characters should have struggled a bit more with each one. But there would have been less time for more obstacles. They move so fast that you don’t worry about the water behind them…