I should start off and say that I have no problem with women in the movies, I like to think that no one would have taken the above statement that way. But in the two adaptations of Journey to the Center of the Earth, women have been added to the expedition, this time in spectacular fashion, and to the overall detriment to Verne's story, which was about exploration and discovery and not about romance. But whatever, being what it is, the 1999 version at least had a moderately interesting story, although one which had little to do with the source material.
Sadly, this made for TV movie is packed with cheesy sets, goofy acting, ridiculous caricatures and atrocious special effects. Obviously, they had to make the film with what budget they had available to them, and I imagine they probably did a great job for what they had to work with, but this three hour epic takes great care to follow some parts of Verne's novel, and in other parts, the entire second half, for example, it flies off on a tangent and goes in a totally different direction. I'm all about creativity, but ever since I read JJules Verne's novel I have been dying to see a film adaptation that was at least moderately interested in adapting the actual story to the screen. So far no such luck.
Among the many things that I found disappointing about this movie, and the one that I had most hoped would have been improved upon from the 1959 version, is the subterranean sea and the surrounding environment. There are some fairly impressive special effects shots that show that there is a ceiling of granite over this massive ocean, but then the rest of the movie that takes place in this underground cavern was simply filmed outside, sunshine and all. You literally have to keep reminding yourself that this all takes place underground because it is so obviously not. And the thing that kills me is that if they had altered the color of the light that was lighting everything they could have solved that. It's right there in the book, it was described as a sort of luminescent, soft, electrical glow, I'm picturing something with a greenish tint. All that natural coloring just kills the whole effect.
Then you have the creatures that they ran into in the novel, literally they caught glimpse of some strange looking humanoid creatures and then took off running, but this movie turns them into an entire society of English speaking people, a full on culture of tribal inhabitants, the interaction with whom provides the majority of the conflict in the movie, and thus is where the real point of the novel is lost completely. The story is no longer about journeying to the center of the earth, but is instead about these outsiders arriving out of nowhere into this society, causing some dangerous conflict with the humanoid underground dwellers that live in the woods near them, and the ultimately trying to make everything right.
Oh yeah, and of course everyone in the movie has some love interest, except for the Scottish, ah, tour guide with the mysterious tattoo on his nose. But he's really only there for comic relief and brute force when needed, so that's to be expected. Needless to say, the young subterranean lover that Jonas, the strapping young explorer, meets in this underground kingdom is not the vaguely humanoid kind of creatures that were described in the book, but a stunning redhead who speaks perfect English. Now, it doesn't bother me that they speak English, because there is a sufficient reason given for that. But to have English speaking people on the journey to the center of the earth is a little distracting. As soon as Ralna say something in English you know the rest of the book is out the window. I just really don't think that anything like this is even remotely what Jules Verne had in mind
