The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen

The heroes of 1899 are brought to life with the help of some expensive special effects in The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. From the pages of Victorian literature come Captain Nemo, Dr Jekyll (and his alter ego Mr Hyde), Dorian Gray, Tom Sawyer, the Invisible Man, Mina Harker (from Dracula), and the hunter Allan Quatermain (Sean Connery), all assembled to combat an evil megalomaniac out to conquer the world.

It's hardly an original plot, but perhaps that's fitting for a movie sewn together like Frankenstein's monster. It rushes from one frenetic battle to another, replacing sense with spectacle--Nemo's submarine rising from the water, a warehouse full of zeppelins bursting into flame, Venice collapsing into its own canals. It's flashy, dumb, and completely incoherent. Fans of the original comic book will be disappointed. --Bret Fetzer