Flicks of Shame: what's a nice actor like you doing in a movie like this?

Murders in the Rue Morgue (1986)

Although he’d already headlined the wartime spoof Top Secret and the George Lucas/Ron Howard fantasy flop Willow, for most people Val Kilmer’s career really took off – ho ho! - when he played Tom Cruise’s hair-gelled rival in Top Gun. However, the same year that he took to the skies in homo-erotic aerial combat with Maverick, Kilmer also played a supporting role in this rather limp - and rarely seen - Edgar Allen Poe TV adaptation.

Staying reasonably close to the particulars of Poe’s rather silly Parisian yarn, the movie still finds room to crowbar in unnecessary characters – such as Kilmer’s Phillipe Huron, godson and protégé to retired detective Auguste Dupin, a man continually referred to as “AAH-GOOSE” by the largely American cast.

Dupin is called back to into action to solve an impossible murder – an elderly seamstress and her daughter, brutally mutilated in a locked attic room – when the pompous Prefect of Police (a pre-Deadwood Ian McShane) promptly arrests a bank clerk for the crime. Trouble is, the bank clerk is the fiancé of Dupin’s daughter (Rebecca DeMornay), an anachronistically forthright young lady who has also caught the eye of Phillipe.

If this sounds like a rather contrived pile of soap opera nonsense to ladle on top of Poe’s fairly streamlined 25-page story, you’d be right. But then, the mystery itself is swiftly solved – Dupin works it out almost immediately, operating more like Sherlock Holmes, and the audience is left trailing in his wake as he drags poor Phillipe from place to place, setting him obtuse tasks, blathering on about logic and deduction, but never actually explaining what’s going on.

Of course, for everyone who has read the original story, this is all just a preamble to the big reveal at the end, when we discover that the culprit in the baffling crime is a shaved monkey. What works on the page – or at least works as a quirky gothic potboiler – is rendered laughably stupid on the screen, as the deadly serious tone gets squashed like a banana at the sight of Val Kilmer defending Rebecca DeMornay by hitting a monkey with a stick. There’s not even much drama in this final confrontation – once Val has demonstrated his monkey-bashing bravery, they simply throw a net over the thing and put it back in its cage.

Need to know: The central role of Dupin was played by the late, great George C. Scott, then a long way from the Oscar-winning glory days of Dr. Strangelove, The Hustler and Patton, slowly fading back into the netherworld of TV movies. His performance is predictably strong, though hamstrung by the lurid screenplay which struggles to pad out Poe’s prose in any meaningful way, this marking the fifth movie adaptation of the yarn.

The first was a silent era quickie released in 1914. Bela Lugosi appeared in a 1932 version, which played up Universal’s then-popular mad scientist angle, while Karl Malden and Jason Robards both starred in versions in 1954 and 1971 respectively. This most recent update was directed by Jeannot Szwarc, a French-born director who cut his teeth on episodes of Night Gallery, Kojak and The Six Million Dollar Man (see: Sandra Bullock). He went on to enjoy a few flirtations with big screen movies – including such timeless classics as Jaws 2, Supergirl and Santa Claus: The Movie – but is now back on the small screen, as a regular director on shows like JAG, Without A Trace and Smallville.

Honourable mentions: More cheesy Kilmer fun can be had by investigating his post-Batman Forever period, which spawned the absolutely ludicrous HG Wells adaptation, The Island of Doctor Moreau (see: David Thewlis) and the enjoyably preposterous killer lion adventure, The Ghost and the Darkness.

Availability: The Murders in the Rue Morgue is available on DVD, with Kilmer’s minor supporting role magically bumped from fifth billing to pride of place.

		Murders in the Rue Morgue (1986) Although he’d already headlined the wartime spoof Top Secret and the George Lucas/Ron Howard fantasy flop Willow, for most people Val Kilmer’s career really took off – ho ho! - when he played Tom Cruise’s hair-gelled rival in Top Gun. However, the same year that he took to the skies in homo-erotic aerial combat with Maverick, Kilmer also played a supporting role in this rather limp - and rarely seen - Edgar Allen Poe TV adaptation. Staying reasonably close to the particulars of Poe’s rather silly Parisian yarn, the movie still finds room to crowbar in unnecessary characters – such as Kilmer’s Phillipe Huron, godson and protégé to retired detective Auguste Dupin, a man continually referred to as “AAH-GOOSE” by the largely American cast. Dupin is called back to into action to solve an impossible murder – an elderly seamstress and her daughter, brutally mutilated in a locked attic room – when the pompous Prefect of Police (a pre-Deadwood Ian McShane) promptly arrests a bank clerk for the crime. Trouble is, the bank clerk is the fiancé of Dupin’s daughter (Rebecca DeMornay), an anachronistically forthright young lady who has also caught the eye of Phillipe. If this sounds like a rather contrived pile of soap opera nonsense to ladle on top of Poe’s fairly streamlined 25-page story, you’d be right. But then, the mystery itself is swiftly solved – Dupin works it out almost immediately, operating more like Sherlock Holmes, and the audience is left trailing in his wake as he drags poor Phillipe from place to place, setting him obtuse tasks, blathering on about logic and deduction, but never actually explaining what’s going on. Of course, for everyone who has read the original story, this is all just a preamble to the big reveal at the end, when we discover that the culprit in the baffling crime is a shaved monkey. What works on the page – or at least works as a quirky gothic potboiler – is rendered laughably stupid on the screen, as the deadly serious tone gets squashed like a banana at the sight of Val Kilmer defending Rebecca DeMornay by hitting a monkey with a stick. There’s not even much drama in this final confrontation – once Val has demonstrated his monkey-bashing bravery, they simply throw a net over the thing and put it back in its cage. Need to know: The central role of Dupin was played by the late, great George C. Scott, then a long way from the Oscar-winning glory days of Dr. Strangelove, The Hustler and Patton, slowly fading back into the netherworld of TV movies. His performance is predictably strong, though hamstrung by the lurid screenplay which struggles to pad out Poe’s prose in any meaningful way, this marking the fifth movie adaptation of the yarn. The first was a silent era quickie released in 1914. Bela Lugosi appeared in a 1932 version, which played up Universal’s then-popular mad scientist angle, while Karl Malden and Jason Robards both starred in versions in 1954 and 1971 respectively. This most recent update was directed by Jeannot Szwarc, a French-born director who cut his teeth on episodes of Night Gallery, Kojak and The Six Million Dollar Man (see: Sandra Bullock). He went on to enjoy a few flirtations with big screen movies – including such timeless classics as Jaws 2, Supergirl and Santa Claus: The Movie – but is now back on the small screen, as a regular director on shows like JAG, Without A Trace and Smallville. Honourable mentions: More cheesy Kilmer fun can be had by investigating his post-Batman Forever period, which spawned the absolutely ludicrous HG Wells adaptation, The Island of Doctor Moreau (see: David Thewlis) and the enjoyably preposterous killer lion adventure, The Ghost and the Darkness. Availability: The Murders in the Rue Morgue is available on DVD, with Kilmer’s minor supporting role magically bumped from fifth billing to pride of place.
Text © 2008 Dan Whitehead. No cut and paste, y'hear? All images remain the property of the offending studios and their reproduction is covered by Fair Use law.