Stone is often
called a Raiders knock off because it
involves a gun toting scruffy guy in a fedora that wanders around the South
American jungle. But really the handful
of things I mentioned in that first sentence are the only commonalities the two
films share.
Look, I don’t want this to be a comparison to Raiders so I’ll make this short and
sweet. Stone takes place in modern day and not in the 30’s, Jack T Colton
(Michael Douglas (Basic Instinct, A
Perfect Murder)) is a bird trapper and not an archeologist, Joan Wilder
(Kathleen Turner (Body Heat, Crimes ofPassion)) is someone who’s never been on an adventure of any kind and not a
tough dame at all (she’s essentially the complete opposite of Marion), pretty
much the entire movie takes place in Colombia and not just the opening, there
is no supernatural element and doesn’t involve some religious aspect, and so
forth.
It’s not right to associate these films with each other
because, as you can see, they’re pretty damn different. Plus I was surprised to find out that the
script for Stone was actually written
years before Raiders. Now with that out of the way let’s move on to
see if this thing is worth checking out based on its own merits.
When Bob Zemeckis got tapped to do Stone he was under a lot of pressure. His first couple of pictures didn’t do so
well (although I really enjoyed I Wanna
Hold Your Hand (I talk about one of the most remarkable parts in the
beginning of this review)) but he was given one last chance to deliver a hit. Well, Stone
turned out to be a smash giving Zemeckis the power to make Back to the Future the next year.
So in the context of the BTTF’s
this film is crucial to their existence.
The story is about a romance novelist, Joan, who has to
venture to Colombia in order to save her sister (Mary Ellen Trainor (The Monster Squad, Die Hard and lots of
other huge shit)) who’s being held for ransom.
The kidnappers (Danny DeVito (TinMen, Batman Returns) and some other guy) want a treasure map that the
sister sent to Joan. But the Colombian
government, or maybe it’s just this one corrupt bad guy who’s using the
government (not sure which), also want the map.
Along the way Joan meets Jack and they fall in love and find the stone
and antics and etc.
That script is the big problem with the movie. First of all it’s convoluted as hell. There’s multiple layers of villains which was
completely unnecessary and ends up diluting instead of enhancing the threat in
my opinion. And there’s also some
backstory about Joan’s sister’s husband who we’re told was murdered (which strangely
no one seems to think is a big deal) and may or may not have a connection to
the stone and/or the treasure map.
Second, the plot is set in motion because of Joan’s sister
and not Joan herself. So in essence this
whole thing isn’t about Joan, Jack or the stone but some character that’s on
screen for maybe 3 minutes total.
Third, almost every single thing that occurs in this film is
a coincidence. Joan happens to get swept
up in a ridiculous situation and meet a man that mirrors what she writes in her
romance novels. Our introduction to Jack
is that he happens to be walking by when Joan is about to be shot for the map. Joan and Jack come across a drug lord that’s
about to kill them on the spot but doesn’t when he realizes it’s Joan Wilder
and he’s a superfan. Joan and Jack
happen to steal one of the bad guys’ car without noticing him sleeping in the
back which sets up shenanigans. And on
and on and on. Jesus. Our lead characters don’t really affect the
story or use their own wits to get out of situations. Whenever they need help it kind of just
happens for them magically.
The result is I don’t care very much about what the hell is
going on. Oh man did this script need to
be worked on a lot more. It’s so messy
and even lazy with how many of the situations resolve themselves out of the
blue. Like when Joan goes to cross a
dilapidated bridge to escape the bad guys she slips and happens to catches a
vine to swing to safety. She didn’t plan
on doing that. It just happened. Admittedly it was funny though when Jack
gives a “holy shit!” in reaction to that.
But then he pulls up a vine and does the same goddamn thing himself
without thinking twice.
Joan and Jack are kinda indestructible. They get shot at a lot, jump off a waterfall,
survive a car chase and even when some henchman goes to hit Jack in the nuts
it’s foiled by Jack stashing the stone in his pants. No real harm is done to these two throughout
the course of the movie.
I really don’t get why this was such a hit guys. I mean the casting is great, it’s shot fine
and it has a fairly good balance of thrills, comedy and adventure (a touch
heavy on the levity if you ask me though).
But what the fuck is up with the confusing setup, the coincidences at every
turn and characters that will get out of any situation unscathed no matter
what.
The last thing I want to mention is that this is rated PG
but there’s definitely some questionably beyond PG shit in here. For example Jack and Joan get drunk and high
by sharing a bottle of hooch and making a weed fire (from a downed drug running
airplane), a lot of “shit” use and one of the villains gets his hand bitten off
by an alligator resulting in a pretty graphic and nasty stump that spews blood
everywhere. This came out the same year
that PG-13 was instituted so I wonder if either the film was looked at before
the new rating went into effect or maybe they gave this one a pass for old
time’s sake. One last ride on the ol’
very deep end of PG, but not enough to be R, horse.
Seriously though, this movie’s kinda crappy.
The Jewel of the Nile
Since Stone grossed
big bucks they decided to do another one the very next year and managed to
retain the core cast of Michael Douglas, Kathleen Turner and Danny DeVito (Bob
Zemeckis did not return because he was doing Back to the Future). This
time a ruler named Omar (Spiros Focas (Rambo
III) who looks and sounds an awful lot like Omar Sharif (Lawrence of Arabia, Doctor Zhivago, The 13thWarrior)) wants Joan to come with him to Africa (to the fictional country
of Kadir) to write his biography. Jack
is jealous that he can’t have Joan all to himself anymore and they decide to
split (this takes place only six months after Stone by the way). Well Jack
finds out Omar is really a horrible dictator that stole the jewel of the Nile so
naturally he has to go rescue her. Oh
and Danny DeVito tags along for some reason.
This is a sequel’s sequel.
They bring back the main characters, split them up to eventually bring
them back together again, there’s a new setting, new obstacles the heroes have
to overcome and the stakes are higher.
But another characteristic that this film possesses, along
with many other sequels, is that it’s extremely forced. The setup is perhaps the biggest offender. Think about what gets this story rolling for
a minute. Some African tyrant picks
moderately successful romance novelist Joan Wilder to spread the word,
predominately in his own region no less, that he’s the greatest person ever and
should be followed into war. How did she
even get on his radar to begin with? She
must have a lot of fans over there. Ok,
even if she was the most famous author in the world it’s still a real tough
sell at best.
The other big contrived element is the inclusion of the Danny
DeVito character. He kind of is a fun, slimy,
devious guy but he really has no business being here. It’s obvious there was a mandate from the
suits that he had to be involved but the filmmakers didn’t know what to do with
him so he ends up following Jack around for a while until they sideline him about
half way through. He doesn’t do shit
again until the very end.
One last negative I want to mention is Joan gets relegated
to a damsel in distress. Sure she didn’t
do a whole lot in Stone but at least
she squared off against one of the main villains at the end. Here she gets kidnapped at the beginning and does
almost nothing to help out or affect the story in any significant way. This wasn’t a strong character to begin with but
they only made her weaker. She hasn’t
grown at all since the last installment which is odd.
Let’s move on to the positives. The filmmakers fixed the most glaring issues
that Stone had. With Jewel
the plot is pretty straightforward and much more streamlined; bad guy steals
Joan and Jack goes to get her back. The
villain (yes, one villain and not several) isn’t a bumbling fool or a purely
evil person that we know nothing about. We
don’t get a ton of insight into Omar but it’s absurdly interesting that Jack
and Joan are up against the head of a country.
That’s kinda serious. And also there
aren’t so many goddamn coincidences.
Jack actually makes decisions and those decisions change how the story
develops. In Stone it felt like Jack and Joan were locked into their destined
path with everything ultimately going their way. In Jewel
you know they’re gonna succeed but they have to work more during their journey.
It’s weird that Stone
is seen as a Raiders wannabe because
I think Jewel is the one that has
more in common with it. Yea I know that Stone is mostly forgotten by this point
and no one has seen Jewel but check
this out. There’s the desert setting which
is where at least half of Raiders
takes place, a scene where Jack and Joan are locked inside of a grounded jet
and they use the weapons on board to shoot the shit out of the bad guys, Jack
goes hand to hand with a huge dude that emerges out of a hut, they get help
from locals that are devoted to the jewel of the Nile (ok that one is really a Last Crusade thing, even though Jewel came out before it) and one of the
most important similarities is that there’s a supernatural religious
element. I don’t think this is much of a
spoiler because they tell you fairly early on that the jewel is really a person
and not a precious stone. He’s a holy
man that gives the people hope and strength…I guess…I don’t quite remember.
However with that last paragraph said, it doesn’t feel like
an Indy movie while you’re watching it. Things
are different enough that I didn’t think about all the parallels until later.
So between the two it’s not the clearest call. Both are pretty weak but I think I had a
better time revisiting Jewel. It’s way better in terms of storytelling and
more cohesive. Stone has this about-to-come-apart-at-the-seams-any-minute vibe. But right before everything completely
unravels a coincidence comes along and puts a band aid on it. Lather, rinse, repeat. Jewel
has a more linear route that progresses in a typical, but acceptable, fashion.
I also like that Jack is nonchalantly crazier in Jewel.
He strolls right up to the front gate of Omar’s fortified palace and
tells the guards that he’s expected. No
plan, no weapons, nothing. That takes
some balls man. Moreover it doesn’t take
much to get him into the idea of riding around a village in a jet shooting up
everything in sight. That scene is a lot
of fun too with a bunch of mayhem and destruction (don’t worry, only the bad
guys get hurt).
Overall though Jewel
is tamer staying with the PG rating instead of upping it to PG-13. And if they actually gave Joan something to
do it would’ve improved things greatly.
Also the finale falls flat with some deus ex machina bullshit and no
real confrontation between Jack and Omar.
In the end Stone
and Jewel are kinda forgettable pictures
that don’t do anything better than a lot of other adventure comedies out there.
Neither one is a diamond in the rough or…a
lost gem. (ooh, that hurt just to type
it)
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