“The Book of Eli” may just be the best-looking dumb movie ever made.
This post-apocalyptic drama from the Hughes brothers directing duo (Allen and Albert) features a wasteland so bleak and bled of color, the film is nearly monochromatic. Its spareness is practically sumptuous.
But the script (by Gary Whitta) is filled with so much idiocy and silliness, we grow distracted from all the great visuals.
The setup is part “Mad Max,” part “Waterworld” (sans water), part “Fallout” video game, and 100 percent bone-headed.
Denzel Washington plays the title character, a wandering badass who possesses the last Holy Bible on Earth. Most of humanity was wiped out 30 years ago, and the few that are left roam the desert preying on each other, or gather into chaotic enclaves.
Eli strolls into one of the latter, a town led by an intelligent, diabolical man named Carnegie (Gary Oldman), who sees in the Bible a weapon with which he can tie the rabble to his yoke.
The last two-thirds of the movie devolves into a series of chases and fights as Carnegie's men seek to wrest the book from Eli's grasp. Eli, armed with a freaky-looking machete and preternaturally fast moves, filets them to bits.
It's a cool, withered world the Hugheses have painted for us. And I’m a sucker for stories about mankind squabbling over the flotsam of their dead society.
But don't be fooled by its great looks: “The Book of Eli” is so stupid, it’s almost unholy.
Video extras are spare for DVD, but terrific in the Blu-ray version.
The DVD has four brief deleted or alternate scenes, and a 5-minute animated comic book story about Carnegie's origins.
In addition, the Blu-ray edition has a pop-up commentary track by the Hughes brothers, which you can pause to watch an additional 34 minutes of "Focus Points" covering all levels of production.
I found it fascinating that the Hugheses commissioned a complete graphic novel version of the story before filming began.
There's also a featurette on the soundtrack, a digital copy of the film, and two documentaries totaling 30 minutes that explore the spiritual implications of Eli's world and mission.
Watching "The Book of Eli," it got me to thinking about other spectacularly dumb post-apocalyptic films. "Waterworld" has very similar themes, even though in "Eli" people constantly fight over water, whereas in the 1995 Kevin Costner movie there's far too much of it.
I hadn't seen "Waterworld" since it came out in theaters nearly 15 years ago, and it was actually a better movie than I remembered. Yes, it is at times a silly, stupid experience. But it seems to recognize itself for what it is, and has a bit of fun with it. Unlike "Eli," which I'm less forgiving toward because it's so self-serious.
As is often the case, Roger Ebert said it best: "'Waterworld' is a decent futuristic action picture with some great sets, some intriguing ideas, and a few images that will stay with me. It could have been more, it could have been better, and it could have made me care about the characters. It's one of those marginal pictures you're not unhappy to have seen, but can't quite recommend."
There was much ridiculing of Costner's get-up in the movie. He plays the Mariner, a mysterious loner who travels a world completely covered in water (or so everyone thinks). He wears a strange array of leather vest, striped pants, long hair pulled back in a high knot, and various dangly bits and weapons.
The Mariner cruises around in a fancy trimaran that he's outfitted with all sorts of contraptions so he can pilot her alone, raising the sails and doing slick maneuvers and such. Like the classic loner of this type of films he's a man of violence but not a bad heart, who wants to be left alone but finds himself caring for some townsfolk he stumbles across.
Since there's no towns, an atoll will have to do. The Mariner puts in there to do some trading, but gets assaulted when he's found to be a mutant. He has gills behind his ears, webbed toes and can swim and breathe underwater. He's about to be executed when the Smokers attack.
The equivalent of the roving gangs of marauders from "The Road Warrior," the Smokers kill and destroy in the pursuit of the few remaining natural resources: Fresh water, dirt, food, etc. They're led by Deacon, the bald-headed villain played by Dennis Hopper.
Deacon gets his eye blown out by the Mariner during the attack on the atoll, and spends the rest of the movie wearing a jury-rigged patch over it -- but not before a hilariously creepy scene in which the Smoker doctor tries to implant a huge fake-looking prosthetic eye into the gaping socket. Hopper is a real hoot in the movie, seeming to realize what a big joke it all is.
The civilians are Helen (Jeanne Tripplehorn), a comely lass, and Enola (Tina Majorino), a young girl with a strange tattoo on her back that turns out to be a map to the last dry land. Deacon wants the map, so he sends out his goons after the Mariner and his passengers.
Like the MacGuffin of the Bible in "The Book of Eli," Enola's tattoo isn't well thought out as a plot device. It's a very simple map, with a big globe and some latitude and longitude numbers, that could easily be copied down after a brief glance. There's no need to actually have the girl in your possession to use the knowledge.
Also, it's made explicit that Enola originally came from dry land, and must have been sent out by her parents/protectors into the watery void. Why? Two bodies are found when they finally reach dry land, peacefully nestled side by side, and somebody says something to the effect that they must have known they were going to die. From what, illness? Both at the same time? Seems unlikely. And even so, if you're going to give your tiny daughter a tattoo so she can find her way back, it's not very helpful to put it on her back where she can't see it.
Director Kevin Reynolds, who previously teamed with Costner on "Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves," stages some nice action sequences in the days before CGI. The film went massively over budget, and various stories even claim that Reynolds walked off the set, or was fired, due to conflicts with his star, who directed the final scenes himself. Whatever the case, their friendship and professional relationship ended with "Waterworld."
"The Book of Eli" may just be the best-looking dumb movie ever made.
I mean it: The Hughes Brothers (Albert and Allen) deliver a post-apocalyptic landscape that's bleak and gritty and so washed out of color, the movie is practically in black-and-white. Cinematographer Don Burgess, an Oscar nominee for "Forrest Gump," delivers a masterfully crafted visual banquet; its spareness is practically sumptuous.
I also mean it about the stupidity -- the Hughes boys and rookie screenwriter Gary Whitta pair these wonderful visuals with a story so nonsensical and silly, it's at least 20 I.Q. points slower than Forrest.
The setup is part "Mad Max," part "Waterworld" (sans water), part "Fallout" video game, and 100 percent bone-headed.
Denzel Washington plays the title character, a wandering badass who's been walking westward ever since nuclear war annihilated most of humanity 30 years ago. (I feel compelled to point out he must be the slowest walker ever -- even if he only hiked 10 miles a day, he could have traversed all of America dozens of times in that span.)
He carries many weapons, including firearms and a bow, but favors a freaky-looking sword that he uses to cut off the hand of a highway bandit who dares touch him in the film's opening minutes. After the rest of his gang has been messily killed, the ruffian reaches for his severed appendage, which Eli kicks out of reach. "I told you you weren't going to get that back," he says.
Clearly a bad dude, right? So perhaps it comes as a shock to learn that Eli is, in fact, a holy man. He's carrying the last Holy Bible on Earth, he says (how does he know that?). He reads it every night, and likes to quote scripture as he's filleting his enemies. But he doesn't seem to live by its precepts very much -- certainly not the turn the other cheek stuff.
Still, it's a pretty cool world that's been painted for us. I'm a sucker for stories about mankind squabbling over the flotsam of their dead society. "We threw things away that people kill each other over now," Eli observes.
But then things get screwy.
Eli wanders into a town run by a boss named Carnegie (Gary Oldman), who's been sending his road gangs out to search for a Bible. It seems in the aftermath of the war, there was a concerted effort (by whom, it's never stated) to burn all the Bibles. Carnegie, a schemer who rules through his wits rather than his muscle, figures to use the holy words as a "weapon" with which he can gather people to him and thereby gain power.
Now, if Carnegie is smart enough to realize religion can be used for nefarious purposes, why does he need a Bible? He could just dream up his own religion, inventing whatever rules and commandments he wanted to suit his purposes, and achieve exactly the same effect. Since Eli has the only Bible, who's to contest Carnegie's version of scripture?
But no, once Carnegie learns that Eli has a Bible, he sends hordes of men with guns after him to procure it.
Eli himself is a little more circumspect about his purposes. All he will say is that he's walking westward until he finds a place where the book is needed. Even Solara, a town girl who tags along with Eli, can't get much more information out of him than that, although he does teach her to say grace before meals. Solara is played by Mila Kunis, who has a knack for comedy but should step away from dramatic material -- she's just this side of awful in this movie.
I don't want to give away too much about the plot, other than to say when Eli's final destination is revealed, one realizes that all of Carnegie's sacrifices have been for naught. He could have just waited in his town until the Bible came back to him.
The film's other idiocies are multitudinous. For example, there's a little ritual the people in town do to prove they're not cannibals: Making others hold up their hands to see if they shake. Eating too much human meat, you see, causes one to have tremors. Eli and Solara learn this for certain when they stumble upon a seemingly nice old couple in the wasteland who have lots of guns and lots of shakes. I guess it sounds neat, until one wonders what biophysical effect one could possibly have from eating human flesh, other than anorexia.
Speaking of which -- for a setting in which everyone is constantly scrapping for food and water, Denzel Washington and the rest of the cast look suspiciously well-fed. I would think double-chins and bellies would be a rarity in the after-apocalypse. Only Oldman looks sufficiently gaunt and withered to belong to the wasteland.
And that's not even getting into the film's metaphysical posturing. The Hughes boys seem to suggest that there is actually something supernatural at work here, particularly with Eli's preternaturally fast combat moves. At one point he takes out a whole gang of men with rifles using only a pistol, which seems to hold an infinite amount of bullets.
But don't be fooled by its great looks: "The Book of Eli" is so stupid, it's almost unholy.
