El Santo

Accept this for what it is- a failed television pilot with added scenes added to pad it out to movie length.

The main reason this never made it to series has to be Eliza Dushku. She is a "black hole" that causes all action to stop any time she is on camera. She behaves as if she is heavily medicated -- delivering each and every line with the same flat monotone. I wonder why any performer with such a severely limited range can have a career even in Hollywood.

The other major failing here is with the basic plot. It is about as generic as possible, Absolutely nothing in this film is even remotely new or fresh -- it all has a "seen this all before many many times" aspect to it.

and if you can give them a giant leeway- perhaps they'd get better over the next year, you could enjoy this. But my God, the last scene, him hiding behind a tree just makes you groan! Can anything scream stupid more than that? I've only seen a few of the original TV show, listened to every dang old radio show- starring Vincent Price, but this is not the Saint. It's some spy dude. And it falls into the same traps every other US (and who knows maybe the world) TV show does, for example, you have a female computer expert, who is not the Saint hence not the star, and when the expert is flummoxed, you have to have the Saint, the star, give a suggestion that even a computer novice like me would know, and the computer expert says something like "Good idea, I didn't think of that." I mean it's really something stupid like "Did you turn it off then on again?" But then, every mystery show does that. They're filled with idiot "experts" that the star has to suggest things to. Plus, some of the dialog is just so stupid. It treats the viewer as an idiot. But who knows, if you can ignore the books, the radio shows, the original TV show and it got non-insulting intelligent writers then maybe this could have been a show worth wasting an hour on. Not a whole-hearted endorsement.

British international thief Simon Templar (Adam Rayner) is known as The Saint. Patricia (Eliza Dushku) is his girl Friday. They are recruited to rescue a kidnapped girl as a devastating past is revealed.

This character has had many reincarnations. This is generally inferior mostly due to the directing efforts of Ernie Barbarash who seems to have made a career of second tier B-movies. It's also notable for Roger Moore's final film. There is some fun chemistry between the leads but the movie doesn't have the writing to accentuate it. It's probably the biggest missed opportunity among so many others.

I love The Saint and often watch several episodes at a time. From the 1962 black & white and into the colour versions finishing 1969. I enjoy them all but there is no way you could make a new version of this show because it was of it's time. Today you can't go around saving ladies from danger and being a Gentleman Adventurer, it is just not believable in today's world so he required a purpose. It is stylishly shot but does lack the glamour of the original, probably down to the fact it started as a TV show then made into a movie.. They even sort of had a slight update on the theme tune occasionally playing in scenes. One of the reviewers said the years haven't been kind to Roger Moore, he was 89 and I would like to know if any of us are going to weather that many years as well.

As a stand alone 2017 update it is OK and I will leave it at that.

RIP Roger and thanks for all the marvellous entertainment you have given me and my Dad over the years.

To know The Saint one must be truthful to the source material. The Saint as a character is brash, abrasive, annoyingly intelligent, and driven by a set a principals to do the right thing, even if "right" in any given instance is stealing, murder, or any other action that on the outside is technically a crime. "The ends justifies the means" is a kind of MO for The Saint, which creates a sort of dilemma - especially in the west - where we tend to regard all individuals - good and bad - to be subject to the same rules. But, is it really a crime if the subject had it coming to them? Such is life of The Saint - getting rich while sticking it to the bad guy. Or saving the girl. Or righting the wrong. Or insert cliché' here. Fun stuff all around.

Unfortunately, most of the texture of The Saint is lost in attempts to portray him just as a lovable, quip-flinging, thief. A sort of James Bond type who always has something witty to say at the right moment. Anyone who has read any of the Charteris novels would strongly disagree.

Which brings us to this latest attempt to put Saint on film. All the elements are there but watered down and cliché'd to the point of atrophy. Although this is the most lovingly adaptation attempt since the Roger Moore days. In short, I like this Saint, but the film won't get out of it's own way. There's been a strong push in Hollywood in recent decades to use technology as a panacea to whatever problem the antagonist might come across. Sixteen-inch steel vault door? No problem - just hack that sucker and in you go.

It gets real old real fast.

We want to see our heroes solve problems, not have them solved for them by inexplicable (and non-existent) technology. In the days of the original Saint - the 1920's and 1930's - you still had to do real detective work to solve mysteries. Now all one needs is a tablet and a wifi connection and you can tell everything about anything anytime anywhere.

Where's the fun in that?

So far as this film is concerned, this Simon Templar is more like the real Saint since Roger Moore - so watch it for that. Otherwise - or in addition to - go find a copy of Meet the Tiger and enjoy the real Saint.