Highlander - Die Quelle der Unsterblichkeit

The bewigged, face lifted, slimmer and worked out, but, still so very handsome, Adrian Paul is back as the Highlander. This junk is horrible. Please, Adrian, the Highlander was great and superlative as a television series, but the Highlander movies (Endgame) and The Source fail, and fail miserably. Let them die. Do no more. I think he got the idea now from the reviews of The Source. This concoction was hard to watch. A murky, dark movie, and dark meaning everything looked as if it were shot in the middle of the night. Acting was awful---some weird plot to find the source--the origin--of the immortals. Adrian walks his way throughout the movie. He knew it was crap. He looks great with his new wig and face lift and slimmer than ever, but this is way beneath his talents. A ridiculous movie with so much screaming and yelling and fighting, it makes no sense. Takes place in some future world with trite sets and some maniac wearing a half helmet acting as a guardian, but to what, I have no clue. The movie has no purpose, no direction. It was awful.

I loved the Highlander series. I loved the first Highlander movie. But holy crap, this movie was terrible.

It has the acting, effects and plot of a made-for-TV Sci Fi channel movie (oh wait...). Everything about the film stunk of terrible quality. It was actually kind of sad to see Paul and the Highlander franchise in general in so bad of a continuation. Nearly every character mailed it in and sleepwalked through their characters. The rest played so over-the-top that you want to hold your head in your hands and groan. And, once again, the Highlander writers find another half-assed reason to make another movie (the prize in the last movie? no no no, that wasn't the REAL prize, THIS is the real prize.).

If you're a Highlander fan, don't even watch this. It butchers that which you love.

"Highlander: The Source" is to "Highlander: Endgame" what "Highlander II" is to "Highlander".

I really liked "Endgame", I thought it was a good way to continue the story set by the TV Series and Adrian Paul proved a more than worthy successor to Christopher Lambert. However, "The Source", which has been in the vaults of Lionsgate since late 2006 is a bitter disappointment.

The first cut of the film has been released on DVD in Russia. I ordered a copy from XploitedCinema.com (a great website, BTW) and watched it last night.

Initial fears were realised when it was revealed that the film was set "In The Near Future", which stirred up bad memories of "Highlander II". The premise of the movie and the motivation of the characters is poorly explained and the execution is rushed, which is very disorientating for the viewer. However, I will try to sum up the plot as succinctly as I can.

A group of Immortals, led by Methos (Peter Wingfield) are trying to locate and verify the existence of The Source, which is believed to be the origins of the Immortals. Methos is reluctant to involve his former good friend, Duncan MacLeod (Adrian Paul), but is forced to when Duncan encounters The Guardian, the Immortal Anti-Christ, while searching for his ex-wife, Anna, who is somehow drawn to The Source.

The Source, good. The Guardian, bad. Got it? Speaking of The Guardian being bad, it's really hard to fear a villain when they talk in a funny voice and act like a complete tool.

The Director, Brett Leonard, overuses trendy editing techniques that modern filmmakers are so eager to apply, giving it a "music video" style, essentially making the direction seem trite and cheap.

The sad thing is that this film has/had potential. While I'm glad to hear that it is currently being re-edited before a general release, I fear that without some re-filming, which I believe is not happening, certain flaws can never be rectified.

Overall, "Highlander: The Source" is a great disappointment, especially to a fan of the Movies and the TV Series.

I thought that Highlander II and the animated Highlander series were the most horrible incarnations ever created, but Highlander: The Source proved to be truly horrible and might win the award for "Worst Highlander Film Ever." The dialogue reads like unedited fanfic, continuity gaps and non-sequiturs are frequent, the special effects are laughable (as in, so bad that they induce involuntary laughter), and the sword fighting sequences -- which make Highlander what it is -- are too painful to watch.

The sad thing is that there was a lot of potential for this story. The overall effect was a movie worthy of a showing on Mystery Science Theater 3000.

I watched this on the Sci-Fi channel, which means that I didn't have to shell out money for a movie rental or a theater viewing, but it still cost me dearly: two hours of my life have been spent. I could have spent that time at the pub, but oh no. I didn't even have the foresight to bring home some beer to dull my senses and make the movie seem to be enjoyable. Highlander had been that much redeemed since Highlander II that I didn't even consider the possibility that it would be a bomb. That reminds me: this movie demands the development of a drinking game.

Highlander fans - there simply are very few ways to enjoy this. Aside from totally ignoring the mythology of both the films and the series, the fight scenes were either poorly choreographed, poorly shot, or both. There are no flashbacks in a film that desperately needed some sort of underlying sub-plot and/or simple explanation of the main plot. The dialogue is cheesy, not one of the characters approaches anything like three-dimensionality (other than the recurring trio from the series - and that's only by virtue of fans' past experience with them), and there is no real motivation given for any of them aside from lame "having visions" plot.

Like the last Highlander film that attempted a futuristic setting, this one misses everything that made the first film and the series great. And unlike Highlander 2, the vision of the future here is never really explained and doesn't make a great deal of sense.

They should have stuck with the monkey and the airplane. (See the trivia section.) I can't even really say that if you aren't a Highlander fan it might be enjoyable - because even then it didn't make a lot of sense. I saw it, so I can't un-see it, but if you haven't spare yourself the train wreck.