DEBRIS.COMgood for a laugh, or possibly an aneurysm

I made the mistake of watching The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen last night. It’s the sort of film that’s so bad I want to ask the filmmakers for my money back. Or better yet, for my time. Maybe I could get Stephen Norrington to come mow my lawn for 110 minutes.

The DVD contains an interview with Sean Connery, who is one of the strong points of this otherwise forgettable film (but only because he’s so fun to watch — he could make a film about programming interesting, so long as he raises his eyebrows at the camera from time to time and mutters something about “passing by reference” or “initializing variables” in that great Scottish brogue).

He said something that makes me wonder what might have been. I bet he’s wondering too, along the lines of “where did I go wrong?!”

According to Connery, he was offered a part in The Matrix, but he didn’t take it because he didn’t understand the script. Later he was offered a part in Lord of the Rings, but again didn’t take it because he didn’t understand the script. Both these film series became huge hits (e.g. 11 Academy Awards for Return of the King.)

Connery admitted that he didn’t understand the LXG script either, but accepted anyway. The unspoken reasoning: this could be the next huge special-effects-laden science fiction blockbuster. Oops.

Let’s take a look at viewer scores for these movies, as tallied by IMDB:

• Fellowship of the Ring: 8.7/10
• The Matrix: 8.5/10
• League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, one of whom is a white Hulk with a tumor: 5.5/10