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HIGHLANDER
III: THE SORCERER (Jan 1995)
aka: HIGHLANDER
III: THE FINAL DIMENSION.
Director: Andrew Morahan.
Writers: Gregory
Widen, Brad Morman, William N. Panzer.
Starring: Christopher Lambert, Mario
Van Peebles, Deborah Kara Unger, Mako, Raoul Trujillo.
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"There
can be only - aah phooey!"
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There
Can Be Only One… er-Three…uh- Seven? Twenty?.. I dunno, does 43 sound
about right?....
by
Jon Dunmore © 24 Aug 2005
HIGHLANDER III: THE SORCERER should heed its own slogan: "There can be only one." There should
have been only one – one HIGHLANDER film, that is. Each sequel
drives another vapid nail into the bottomless coffin that has become the HIGHLANDER
franchise. HIGHLANDER was a magnificent film and, quite obviously upon
viewing, a completed story; there was never any question of a sequel - until the
advent of Mongoloid Marketeers, All Budget, No Brains.
And
a shameful pity that in favoring the original HIGHLANDER movie, one must
add qualification these days. There was nothing like HIGHLANDER when
it appeared; directed by Australian music-video director, Russell
Mulcahy, featuring a kinetic soundtrack driven by Queen, a story involving Immortals
all hiding in plain view amongst Earth's populace, congregating for The Gathering,
to battle for The Prize – the gift of foresight and mortality – and
to be The One; featuring newcomer Christopher Lambert, suitably ingenuous as the
Scottish Highlander Connor MacLeod, and Sean Connery aggressively fey as his swashbuckling
tutor, Ramirez.
HIGHLANDER was engaging, humorous, poignant, original, well-written and well-filmed.
Each successive sequel has been exactly the opposite.
Regarding THE SORCERER (aka THE FINAL DIMENSION), it is quite pointless reviewing
or in any way even describing the plots of movies which do not adhere to their
own internal logic. In this case (barring the first exceptional installment),
this whole series has been battling against itself, in reneging on its own oft-repeated
slogan: "There can be only one". Well, obviously not...
The
disjointed characters move through THE SORCERER'S listless plot with no
regard to continuity or semblance of purpose – they just end up where they
need to be for a scene to play itself out – all those scenes which were obviously
pitching points for the producers to lay on the money-men. It mattered not how to join those scenes, as long as the money was green and the picture was green-lighted.
Also
directed by a former music-video director, Andy Morahan, THE SORCERER
displays none of the art and eye that Mulcahy brought to HIGHLANDER, though
Morahan has no qualms in plagiarizing Mulcahy's film at every turn, inserting
"flashback" scenes to gird the storyline and attempt poignancy, copying
scenes (talented actor/director Mario van Peebles, heinously miscast as the villain
Kane, doing a pale impression of The Kurgan), and just blatantly repeating
scenes from HIGHLANDER.
The
movie's early sequences display more than enough chinks in its feeble armor, where
we catch up with MacLeod sometime after HIGHLANDER, but before HIGHLANDER II: THE QUICKENING, which, according to this film, apparently never
happened. Then the illusion of plot collapses completely when MacLeod gets shot
in a New York alley and in the next scene is being frantically dollied to an Emergency
Room. Now: who in New York would look twice at a shot guy in a deserted alley,
let alone ring it in?
Then
it gets even more idiotic. Fast than you can say "Sean Connery appears out of nowhere."
Upon
awakening on the hospital dolly, his wounds healed, MacLeod becomes violent and
the obviously unfit-to-practice doctor diagnoses him as "insane" in
three seconds of fighting interns, drugs him and sends him to the lunatic ward.
The only apparent reason for this seems to be to execute one of those screenwriter
pitch scenes: Kane's medieval henchman stalking MacLeod through modern hospital
corridors (how he located him in this facility - with no time for even an efficient
hospital's paperwork to be processed - is beyond comprehension) and, though
MacLeod is randomly trying to find an exit and the henchman is stalking purposefully,
somehow both end up in the same basement laundry room. After all that setup -
the shooting, the dollying, the lunatic ward, the stalking – MacLeod beheads
the henchman with no fanfare and the movie moves on, into further contrived plot-less-ness.
The
swordplay was choreographed by Young Billy from the sixth grade. A suitable nomenclature
would be "air-guitar sword-fighting," i.e. rather than actually trying
to slice and dice each other's bodies, the opponents slash at the AIR above each
other's heads and parry these strokes as if they were vital. In one sequence,
Kane slashes at MacLeod, who parries Kane's stroke, only to have his sword shatter
under Kane's blow. Kane's follow-through, which should have then neatly severed
MacLeod's head, doesn't go anywhere near it – what then, was Kane slashing
at?
Sultry
Debra Kara Unger plays The Chick and - like Roxanne Hart from HIGHLANDER –
is aroused uncontrollably by the concept of Immortality, her foreplay also being
the sight of MacLeod getting stabbed. Guess immortality is a magnet for sexual
loonies….
Stereotypical
moron cops, whose gratuitous swearing seemed unfamiliar to their untrained-actor
mouths, hound MacLeod, whilst Kane kidnaps MacLeod's child, setting up the conundrum
where The Hero can't kill The Villain because he alone knows where The Hero's
child is.
But
MacLeod kills Kane anyway. So much for strategic conundrums.
After
the explosive climax – not describing the level of excitement, but rather,
the many gratuitous explosions - when MacLeod is once again
levitated with the electric ecstasy of being The Last Immortal Ever – ahem,
again – his son walks nonchalantly down some stairs and reunites with him
as if he's just walked in from the kitchen.
To
put the weak capper on an altogether limp movie, an impotent rock song sings us
out over the end credits.
Where's
Sean Connery when he's least needed?
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HIGHLANDER
III: THE SORCERER (Jan 1995)
Director: Andrew Morahan.
Writers: Gregory
Widen, Brad Morman, William N. Panzer.
Starring: Christopher Lambert, Mario
Van Peebles, Deborah Kara Unger, Mako, Raoul Trujillo.
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