Top positive review
5.0 out of 5 starsCall me crazy but i liked this adapation.
Reviewed in the United States on April 8, 2014
The Kirk Douglass adaption from 1954 will always be my favorite adaption of the classic novel. It had the perfect cast, story line but the one problem with that one was to an extent it followed the novel and changed the novel around the movie with a cold war feeling set back in the 1866. Now i do not have a problem with that there were certain elements i liked changed with the original movie, and made the movie well! But in 1997 it was decided the movie would be remade for television, one for CBS and one for ABC. I didn't like the CBS one with Ben Cross, but it did follow the novel like the original movie to an extent. Like the other two versions this one had more points of the novel in the movie but at the same time it didn't. The movie starts out with Pierre Arronax played by Patrick Dempsey saying he thinks a giant narwal is whats been attacking ships, using the same text from the novel to tell his fathers peers his father mocks him out and he is made a joke. But the cunard line with the US government wants to hunt the beast, and with him, a guy he befriended on the train who was African American, and Ned Land they go to hunt the monster only to find out it isn't a monster. Now this movie has the volcano sequence from the novel, the south pole sequence, Brings up his Indian background, the girl they help, and Atlantis,thou different from the novel a lot of Nemos dialogue from the novel. It does have a lot of stuff written for it. It tries to bring in the issue with slavery, Ned Land is made his character from the novel who wants freedom at whatever the cost, Nemo is brutal to his guests, and he is also part robot. Now however i liked these changes, i also liked how it told the prospective from the US government trying to hunt the beast, i thought these scenes MADE this special. It depends on how much you like the novel or the movie back from the 1950s but either way i liked all three the 1954, the novel and this adaption from 1997. If you want something completely faithful to the novel, theirs the cartoon versions from the 1980s and there was one from nickelodeon from 2002 that was faithful other then having a lead female character in it, like this adaptation.