Culture To Go

But the fact that this film stinks to high heaven doesn't explain why nobody went to see it. Nobody went to see it because nobody could buy the idea of Geena Davis as a pirate queen. Like most of our movie stars, Geena (I hope I can presume to call her that, she's so big-sisterly) is primarily a physical specimen: limbs long and slender, bold yet delicate jawline, softly protuberant lips, row upon row of flashing teeth--the very model of a pirate queen, I would have thought. I remember, however, sitting in the cinema last summer, when the trailer for Cutthroat Island came on. The minute Geena appeared, swinging her cutlass, the audience began to snicker. Oh, she looked just fine, on the outside. But there's a particular sort of human soul at the controls of her anatomical equipment, and that unconcealable soul--though it's amiable and charming, and I'm actually very fond of it--lacks gravitas. Why else would she divorce Jeff Goldblum, the most interestingly eccentric actor in Hollywood, only to marry Renny Harlin, producer/director of Cutthroat Island and possibly the biggest idiot in the whole world? (Steve Schroer)