Cutthroat Island

Rating:
Summary: Fast paced pirate action! Lots of fun.
Review: Geena Davis plays female pirate Morgan Adams ala Anne Bonny and Mary Read, who were real 17th century pirates. Lots of fast paced action complete with swordplay, throat slitting, explosions galore and a romantic subplot. Morgan Adams can plunder my treasure any day. Her scabbard's fit every sword in the crew!

Rating:
Summary: "Love...who can explain it?"
Review: I'm not sure if it's still true, but at one time Cutthroat Island was considered biggest box-office loss of all time. Sometimes when a film isn't a success the reasons why are obvious. Sometimes a film comes out at the wrong time. Sometimes a film is too radical to have mainstream appeal. And sometimes...I have absolutely no idea why a film isn't a success.

This film is a great movie in the modern sense. By that I mean tha the dialog is cheesy, the plot is predictable, the characters are lovable and the budget is massive. In some movies you wonder where all the money for the special effects wnet. Not this time. In this spectacle of celluloid you will witness the destruction of entire towns, and see a ship literally blown into toothpick-size pieces! As you would hope for, there is a ton of action-filled swordfights and silly romance as well.

With awesome sound effects, a rousing musical score, and lavish cinematography, perhaps the real deciding factor in a person's feeling of love or hate toward this one will be Geena Davis' portrayal of the Mogan Adams, possibly the toughest female ever to sail across the silver screen. Visibly doing most of her own stunts (some of which look incredibly dangerous, if not outright painful), pretty much all of the drama, comedy, romance, and action is centered on her. Personally, I find her performance charming and her stuntwork through the numerous action sequences inspiring.

I think everyone should see this film at least once, if only for the stunts, explosions, swordfights, and wonderfully cheesy dialog. Pirate movie fanatics should order a copy immediately and prepare to set sail!

Rating:
Summary: Avast ye mateys....This movie is bad. Poor Geena Davis.....
Review: How bad is Cutthroat Island? I don't think there's a word to describe it. The lesson here is $100 million can buy you a lot of special effects and big name stars but it can't buy you a decent screenplay to base the movie on.
Geena Davis fresh off the success of Thelma & Louise tries to make the world's first feminist Pirate movie. Unfortunately she looks and feels out of place. I was never able to suspend my disbelief watching her in the role of a pirate. Her acting isn't on the level of her great work in The Accidental Tourist and Thelma & Louise, It's the worst performance of her career. It's like she forgot everything she learned about acting. In a lot of scenes she gets shot and stabbed, but in later frames doesn't act injured at all. I guess they were trying to show how tough she is unfortunately she looks ridiculous.
The film has lavish set pieces, and elaborate stunt work. Unfortunately it's not seamless. In many frames you can see the stuntmen! The plot about pirates traveling the world for a treasure just doesn't come together. The story has holes you can drive a pirate ship through. You never believe the fantasy because of Davis' wooden performance and the poor special effects.
Geena Davis' career never recovered after this disaster. If you like her work get the Accidental Tourist or Thelma & Louise. If you want to see a strong female hero, Check out Alien.



Rating:
Summary: Not the best film, but lots of piratey goodness
Review: Cutthroat Island is not a great film. I do know however, that the production crew, and in particular the props and costume folks went all out toward accuracy. That attention to detail does show through, even if the script is cheesy and cliche'.

Frank Langella was wonderful as Dawg Brown. I wanted to see more of him, and I wanted to know more of his motivations, more of the history behind he and his brothers Mordechai and Harry and the story behind the gold. Gina Davis was really a very good heroine in this movie, as Morgan Adams. She is now captain of the ship she has inherited from her father, Harry and as a woman, she has her challenges on a shipload of men, to be sure. But she is energetic and tough enough to make you believe it is within the realm of possibility. Davis' beauty is found in her underlying strength. The disappointment in her character for me lie in the fact that she far outshone Matthew Modine. Modine's performance was rather flat when set next to the leading lady and he seemed almost like a Saturday morning cartoon, or a young father playing pirates on the city park playground with his own children. It just did not come off as a very good performance at all. The spark between Davis and Modine was not at all believeable. If they had gotten someone else to play that role who was a bit more of a leading man, the movie may have been a lot better. I keep wanting to cast someone like Oded Fehr or Brandon Frazier, or someone of that ilk.

If you like pirates or sea faring flicks, I would say definitely add it to your collection. It is not nearly as tight and polished as say Pirates of the Caribbean, but that is ok. This film is still somewhat of a good time.

Rating:
Summary: Loads of fun...if you're 13!
Review: It's understandable that this movie never made it big. The acting is ridgedly cardboard, the realism strained, and the underlying romantic story nearly non-existant. There are some nice blockbuster special effects and some crafty stunt work, but they too often get mixed in along with the lousy (obvious?) effects and ridiculous sword play. The two saving graces of the movie are the fantastic (if not unrealistic) pyrotechnics work and the movie score. If you have to choose between the two, pick up the soundtrack over the movie.

Rating:
Summary: Great non-stereotypical pirate movie!
Review: When I say non-stereotypical I mean that the pirate captain is a woman portrayed by Geena Davis (if I don't mistake, history tells about a female pirate skipper). Many reviewers bash this movie without good reasons. It had a good story line, great action with the best galleon explosions I have ever seen, and beautiful sets and costumes.

Rating:
Summary: Excellent Story; DVD Just Doesn't Make the Cut
Review: 4 and 1/4 Stars
I recommended this movie instead of Pirates of the Caribbean .... Given that, I have to defend it against the bitter nay-sayers. Don't get me wrong, Pirates had many positive aspects - Depp's performance chief among them; and yet, it was just too kid friendly (well duh, that's Disney). I whole heatedly believe that Cutthroat was as good, if not far better than Pirates. I would yield to the arguments that the acting here is a bit cheeky, and the editors could have been a touch more through. Beyond that, I don't know what the fuss is about. Maybe the other reviewers just couldn't stomach a (historically improbable) female pirate. Well, I think this movie was a lot of fun, but apparently there are some who didn't care for it. The best advice I can offer here is for all of you out there to watch it, and make up your own minds.