The Emerald Forest

John Boorman's latest picture is not quite what I expected, but that's not the biggest problem I had with it. The biggest problem I had with it was that I didn't believe it. At least I didn't believe enough of it. I had been looking forward to this movie eagerly, since I am something of a Boorman fan. I really liked “Deliverance,” and I (even if nobody else) thought that “Excalibur” was a near-great film. Now Boorman has teamed up with the writer of “Excalibur”—Rospo Pallenberg (who has such a great name it ought to be in a movie)—to create a tale which seemed ideally suited to their respective talents; that is, a story, which is essentially about man vs. the unseen nature of things, man struggling to maintain some sense of balance in a completely alien world, a world steeped in mysticism, which seems controlled by forces just barely beyond the edge of our perception. Well, there is a lot of that here, but it always comes down to this: I didn't believe it. I think part of the reason that I so emphatically didn't believe it was that the filmmakers so emphatically wanted me to.

The ads, and even a prologue in the picture, keep telling us over and over that it is "based on a true story." Now, I don't doubt that the seed of the story has its foundation in truth; according to something I recently read by Boorman, it was originated with an article that Pallenberg once clipped from a paper, about a small boy being kidnapped by Indians in the Amazon, and about his father's relentless search to find him. I believe that. But I don’t believe that people can put their spirits into eagles and fly around looking for things. I don't believe that a tribe which supposedly had never had contact with the outside world would become the private army of a group of white slavers. I don't believe that the Indians can conjure up a rain big enough to destroy a modern dam, nor do I believe that the man who built this dam would set off explosives to help the rain do just that, even if it was supposed to help his son. There is a lot of mysticism in the film; shades of “Excalibur” abound, and I began to wonder whether Boorman had watched “Altered States” one too many times. About halfway through, it even started to take on some of the elements of “Raiders.” I think I would have been much happier if the makers of the picture had said nothing about its being based on anything and had just let me enjoy it as pure fiction.

As it was, I kept doubting everything I saw, enjoying the film, but being a skeptical kill joy the whole while. I mean, just how much of a true story does a film have to adopt in order to be "based" on it? If I write a story about a man who crosses on a tightrope from one tower of the World Trade Center to the other, but halfway across he falls, only to discover that he can fly, so he dons a costume and starts fighting evil throughout the world, can I add credence to the story by saying that it is "based on a true story" just because a man once did actually do the above-mentioned acrobatic feat? Get my drift? The way the whole world was spelled out in the picture was just a little on the far side of reasonable. It's not that I don't want to believe all those amazing things; in fact I do. But I don't. If the film was presented as legend (a la “Excalibur”) I could indulge myself in the luxury of belief. I could accept it as fact somewhere in that vestigial portion of the brain which still believes in witches and warlocks. But try to force me to accept it as a true story here and now, and it's hard not to rebel against it the whole way.

Even the way the kidnapping tribe is portrayed is so peculiar that it dissipated the believability. For a tribe (the "Invisible Tribe") which has never seen the outside world, they sure act a lot like New Yorkers. They hang out, they flirt, they crack jokes, and when they are confronted with the outside world (the "dead world" as they call it) they take it in amazing stride. When Tommy, the kidnapped boy (grown now) lays down for the first time with his new wife, it could easily be Rhett lying down with Scarlett. These Indians are so fun I wanted to go and hang out with them for a while, and for that reason the strangeness is gone; these people are Indians only because they paint themselves and wear odd clothes. Thus, when Bill Markham finds his son (by the sheerest of coincidence, mind you), it is much too easy for him to accept what he finds. There's no tension. (Hell, Tommy even recognizes him, though as out of a dream. When Bill tells Tommy that he is his father, Tommy replies, "You are not Father, you are Daddee,” which I have to admit is a nice touch).

The point is you have to be very suspicious of any picture which claims some element of truth, but still contains a credit for "Tribe Choreography." As Bill, Powers Boothe turns in a very stoic performance, rather believable as a man obsessed, although therein is one of the things about the picture that surprised me. I really expected it to be about a 10-year obsession on the part of the father, about what he must endure in order to find his son. In fact, the ten years are dispensed with in ten seconds, by the use of a couple of printed sentences onscreen, and we jump right to the newest (and successful) journey. Bill has to endure quite a bit, all right, but it is physical, Indiana Jones-type stuff. The sequence in which he is chased by the "Fierce People" is rather thrilling, but we expect that from Boorman (and, dammit, the Fierce People kept reminding me of the Baseball Furies from “The Warriors,” probably because of their paint jobs). Indeed, there are quite a few sequences with a lot of power, and certainly a lot of beauty, and Boorman does maintain the ability to make us look at commonplace objects in a new way, to see the strangeness and the menace of them, but ultimately, that's what we are left with.

By the time the good tribe has gone to avenge themselves on the bad tribe (with the help of Bill and some good ol' firearms) and to rescue their fair maidens (really!) the picture has wound up looking like “Son of Rambo,” and the audience cheers when the evil white slavers get blown away by Bill's ultra-modern shotgun. Where oh where has our mystical foundation gone? Where is the inherent sense of order and perspective that would be achieved by having the dark powers of the jungle triumph over the evil modern world without the help of guns or explosives? Nowhere, that’s where. Charlie Boorman (yes, the director’s son) does a nice job as Tommy (who, within the first seconds of the picture, displays the penchant for wandering off which is the cause of all his later problems), though I cannot see that the role demanded that much in the way of acting per se. In the end, he stays with the tribe, in the jungle, and the father understands, and who cannot think of “Greystoke” here? The only difference being that Greystoke covered the same ground with so much more finesse. John Boorman should have been guided more by his sense of magic, and less by his need to make a statement. The film's closing frames include some cautionary titles about the destruction of the Amazon Rain Forest, and the Indians who live there. "Some tribes," read the titles, "have never had contact with the outside world." (Obviously not the tribes we've seen in the film.) "They still remember,” the titles continue, “what we have forgotten." Fine. That's fine John. I care, I really do, about the destruction of the Rain Forest, and I try to maintain my sense of wonder at the magic of ancient cultures. But I couldn't help feeling a little resentful. Don't patronize me, John, and don't lecture me. Not after you've made a picture that has a "Tribe Choreographer."

Enough

Short Take

I'll say. Further proof, I guess, that J-Lo can't act. Of course, any star might falter with this lame-brained script, and the added ignominy of having the character you play named "Slim" (even though you are an attractive modern woman and not a cowhand in some thirties western). Neither quite as awful as most of the reviews suggested, yet at the same time no good at all, the movie tells the story of the aforementioned Slim, a waitress who winds up improbably wed to the handsome and rich Mitch, only to have him turn into a psychopathic, philandering wife-beater. The subsequent chase and revenge story carries neither the redemptive charge we might hope for, nor any worthwhile insight into the plight of women who find themselves in these situations. Indeed, by suggesting that these dreadful predicaments can be solved by a few boxing lessons and some electronic gizmos, the film could be viewed as an insult to people everywhere who find themselves victimized by intimate partners.