Christopher Columbus: The Discovery

What with all the recent hue and cry over the anniversary of that famous voyage by a lowly Genovesian cartographer, it should hardly come as a shock that Hollywood so readily jumped on the historical revisionist bandwagon. It is annoying, however, that director Glen (best known for his work putting 007 through his paces of late) decided to jump ship in the reality department and run this flounder onto the rocks so thoroughly. You know something's gone terribly amiss as soon as the lights go down and the titles come up, telling you that this is an Alexander and Ilya Salkind production...with Marlon Brando (“Superman!?” I cried, thinking I had slipped into the wrong screening). We all know the story, so there's really no need to go into it here. As far as the most salient points of the Columbus mythos, screenwriter Mario Puzo (!) sticks to the broader interpretations of the history books, but when it comes to main characters involved, The Discovery comes across more like cut-rate, bargain-basement ABC Movie of the Week than it does as a legitimate take on that squirrelly little explorer of yore. What made Brando (in his woefully one-note performance as Chief Inquisitor Torquemada) and Puzo (from The Godfather to this -- the senses reel) dive into this briny wasteland is probably better left unknown. Corraface's Columbus is a darkly handsome, square-jawed adventurer who -- when he's not busy pushing his rather flimsy case for discovery -- manages to seduce everything on two legs. As you might expect, Tom Selleck as King Ferdinand leaves more than a little to be desired; it's odd that in a period piece such as this, seemingly every single character speaks with a different accent (on the plus side, though, many of the characters suffer from advanced periodontal disease -- a matter of course in those times but one that Hollywood ceaselessly overlooks in 99% of their historical dramas). Rumor has it that a number of Native American groups are actively protesting the portrayal of their ancestors in this film, and well they should. Portrayed by Glen and crew, the Indians are little more than simpering brown-skinned dolts, anxious to appease these “gods from afar,” and then only too eager to massacre them once things start to look bad. Too bad, then, that in Christopher Columbus: The Discovery, things start to look awful from reel one on. Here's hoping Ridley Scott can pull it off when his version of the same events opens in October.