Uma Viagem ao Inferno

While by no means a truly awful movie, this really has little to recommend - the cast do a reasonable job with a poor script, some of the action builds a little dramatic tension but the plot is hopelessly unoriginal, has some big old holes in it and the animosity built up between the two couples is totally unjustified by events in the first half. Roberts' villain is as hammy as they come - check the scene where, to everyone's obvious disgust, he savours (shock! horror!) a cigarette after a dramatic macho race scene. There's also some implausible explanation of plot devices - Hauer suddenly sees through the whole dastardly plot building around him in a truly laughable moment. OK, but for fans of the stars only.

Two actors who are very, very dear to me, together here, Rutger Hauer and Eric Roberts. Both are physically endowed, by the way they look, and with a maximum, unique, absolutely exceptional talent. With 628 credits on IMDb, Eric Roberts I think is the most workaholic in the entire history of world cinema. As in many other movies, here he plays a negative role and he does it so well that you want to see him dead faster, killed by Rutger Hauer. Rutger Hauer, who also played some famous and excellent negatives himself, here is the positive character. Along with his gentle wife, in the movie, Karen Allen. I won't say more, just watch it and judge for yourself if those who wrote bad about this film were right or not.

Voyage is a somewhat underrated film. It stars Rutger Hauer and Karen Allen as a couple preparing to enjoy a year-long voyage on their yacht. Unfortunately they are joined by another couple who aren't quite what they appear. Eric Roberts marvelously plays the antagonist. I was very pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed this film. I watched another version of this story with Kate Jackson. It just reiterated to me how good a film this is. It's good! Honest!

This is a cookie cutter movie, as formulaic as they come for the genre of middle-to-upper class couples with marital problems getting screwed by weirdos aboard their yacht.

Rutger Hauer and Karen Allen play that failing married couple who hope that a voyage on their yacht will rekindle something nice about their marriage while they're sailing around the coast of Italy. Of course, any chance of that happening is quickly interrupted when Gil Freeland (Eric Roberts in his usual weirdo thriller style), the former high school classmate of Rutger Hauer's character, and his over-sexed wife tag along for the ride after being stranded with some excuse about a delayed business meeting. But, the trip with the couple, though obviously bizarre at first, goes out of control when Freeland and his wife reveal their true nature...and their true motives. So, Rutger Hauer and Karen Allen have to protect themselves from the crazy couple.

From beginning to end, it is predictable. What a shame, too, considering the cast, the relatively low budget (looks like BBC mini-drama styled photography), and the beautiful setting, that they couldn't do anything creative here. "Dead Calm" is a much better choice for this kind of thriller.

I love movies with small casts and isolated settings, with VOYAGE being the among the best of such. This is like Roman Polanski's KNIFE IN THE WATER, only this time we have great actors all around.

Hauer is his usual great subtle acting machine. His face seems to have a thousand muscles and he can say more with an expression than the boring interchangeable "stars" of today can in an entire career.

And Eric Roberts is the perfect opposition for Our Boy Rutger with an incredible heel performance. I'll never forget when he says to Hauer with sinister glee "I'll turn your head around backwards!"

Why aren't the exceptional Roberts and greatest living actor Hauer more popular? Because in order to be popular one has to be mediocre.