20,000 lieues sous les mers

I have nothing against fun and fantasy. But this piece has so little to do with Verne's story that I wonder why the writers didn't just dispense with their token analogies to it and create new characters!

Yes, Caine's performance is "intense", but also utterly meaningless: his Nemo has none of the subtlety, the pensiveness, the drivenness of James Mason's; the two can no more be compared than Kevin Costner's Robin Hood can be compared to Errol Flynn's, or Marlon Brando's performance as Bligh in Mutiny on the Bounty to Charles Laughton's. The ballyhooed "intensity" of Caine's portrayal resolves itself into very little more than hypermanic nuttiness. (Maybe Caine was trying so hard to avoid being compared to Mason that he couldn't figure any other way to do the role than to toss all subtlety overboard?)

The character of Attucks, of course, is the "man of action" that the plot needs, thus totally eclipsing Ned Land and making the latter's presence gratuitous. So if the writers were so obsessed with political correctness that they needed to add a nonwhite character, why in the world not just make Ned himself nonwhite?

And haven't we had enough of upstarts trying to improve on Verne by adding a love interest? Apparently not: this version gives Nemo a daughter, who sails with him on the Nautilus and with whom Aronnax (here depicted as a young sexpot) has an affair.

Of course, the fact that this Nautilus has a multi-ethnic crew (an idea hinted at, but not developed by, Verne himself) is a nice touch, but one that doesn't take us very far because this version tells us so little about Nemo's and the crew's background. In conclusion, a lot of fine acting talent is wasted on this philosophically confused piece of work.

Verne has suffered a bewildering number of bad adaptations, but this is ridiculous.

I was in the seventh grade when I saw this movie and going through a Jules Verne/Robert Louis Stevenson phase. I loved the original movie and when I found out the cast for the remake my face must have just lit up because my parents gave me a blank tape for when it came on. I didn't have a chance to watch it the night it was on, so I saved the movie for a rainy day. What a waste of a rainy day. It started off well, the acting was great and they were trying to hold onto the original message. Then, it kept going and going and soon I wasn't sure what the point was anymore. The ending was the worst part and I found myself taping over it a year later. Oh well, another remake that fell short of the theme.

Could this film have been made in the 50s? Was the black guy in Jules Vernes novel? I don't think so, but then it's been a while since I read the Classics Illustrated version of this one. The special effects are outstanding, in fact gives me even more incentive to go for that big screen TV I keep trying to buy. This one is movie theater material.....the romantic interests are there--still going white on white, colored on colored...but we can't have everything at once. The ugly father's mistress plants one on his son, but that's all in the background.

The primary star here is the submarine and Nemo, looking just like the funny book. We never find out why he is the 'man without a country', self-exiled, but it seems to have cost him his wife. The fellow obsessed with freedom and his redundant escape attempts is a hunk, and his brainlessness is well acted.

I don't think he is of the same cut as the brutal, humiliating father though. Verne must have had some parental issues, as they say. The father hates the son cause he lost his wife in childbirth.

There was some attempt to bring in Civil War issues as well, but they are cloudy. The suspense is wonderful, as Nemo and crew attempt to bring the sub up from under the ice. As I watched the diving bells (so up to date, yet written in 1899) and the divers fighting the giant squid (in the same costume practically as I saw in today's Boston Globe), I couldn't help but think of the brave divers who are about to risk their lives down in that murky, human-hostile area south of Nantucket....seeking to answer the question of why yet another jet went down.

The age-old but new questions are well demonstrated in this movie: What price glory...as the pseudo-scientist/father steals the sub in order to board the submarine first? How strong is the drive for freedom in men's souls? Of course, some of us have to have the bars clang shut and the leg-irons on before we understand how much freedom we've lost.

But the REAL question: Who was that hunky black guy and why haven't we seen him in other movies since? He was a good actor and beautiful!!!

And great going, Michael the acting is right on!!!

jules verne makes imaginative books, but let's face it, the attempts to move them to the big screen are destined to fail. especially if you're lacking money. jules had such wild ideas that they cannot be produced anywhere but inside the readers mind.

this particular one has a great cast, but the mini way too long compared to the boredom it arouses. i had to use three days to watch it because i kept falling asleep.

the special effects look amateurish, and all the intensity from the book has vanished somewhere in the production. all i felt about it was a little claustrophobia.

a tip to the crew: you should have asked the champ, kevin costner, he could have probably told that it's not automatically an epic if you make it long. you need some events, too, you know.

1997 saw two TV versions of Jules Verne's classic and I suppose which ever a viewer saw first would forever tarnish their view of the second (Warning: I saw the other version first.) This means neither film was all that bad, neither all that great, and neither threw the Disney version off it's pedestal as being the true film classic (James Mason, Kirk Douglas, and Peter Lorre are a tough act to follow). Personally, I will watch ANYTHING remotely associated with Jules Verne so don't get too upset at my review, I did purchase it for my collection. Yet, compared to the other TV version, this version which features Michael Caine as Captain Nemo is overlong and without style. It boasts a great cast (well cast and decent performances), nice sets, and sufficient special effects, but little imagination. While it lights up like a Christmas tree in production values, it pales in making anything seem interesting. I expect remakes to show me something a little different than what I've seen or read and this whole film tries to base itself on things all too familiar. Dig deeper! Please read my review of 1997's other "20,000 Leagues Under the Sea" for that film had style and some original additions. In previous versions we were awed by James Mason behind his pipe organ like the Phantom of the Nautilus, and Ben Cross chilled us as he stood atop his submarine like a Russian commander with American gun fire bursting around him. In this version Michael Caine's bags under his eyes suggested he was quite tired and made me feel very sleepy as well. 1969's "Captain Nemo and the Underwater City" with a nothing budget and a bland cast (Robert Ryan, Chuck Conners!!!) was more interesting! But it is Jules Verne and can be proud to be the second best made-for-TV version of "20,000 Leagues Under the Sea" to be aired in 1997. I may have been a little harsh, but I think Captain Nemo would have it no other way.