There's no lack of style or pace from Noyce, just the sense that it isn't quite gelling together.
Comment
05/20/08
The Saint (1997)
30 %
Reviews Counted: 44 Fresh: 13 Rotten:31 Average Rating: 4.6/10
Consensus:
The Saint is watchable thanks to Kilmer and Shue, but the muddled screenplay stretches credulity.
Runtime: 1 hr 58 mins
Synopsis: Simon Templar (Val Kilmer), AKA The Saint, realizes his skill for trickery during his childhood in a Far East orphanage. He uses his natural born gifts, including a penchant for bizarre and effective disguises, to obtain things for people which they can not obtain themselves. When he is hired... [More]
Genre: Action/Adventure
Starring: Val Kilmer, Elisabeth Shue, Rade Serbedzija, Valeri Nikolayev, Henry Goodman
Director: Phillip Noyce
Composer: Graeme Revell
Story: Jonathan Hensleigh
Screenwriter: Jonathan Hensleigh, Wesley Strick
Producer: David Brown, Robert Evans, William J. MacDonald, Mace Neufeld
Composer: Graeme Revell
Story: Jonathan Hensleigh
Screenwriter: Jonathan Hensleigh, Wesley Strick
Producer: David Brown, Robert Evans, William J. MacDonald, Mace Neufeld
Reviews
Top Critic
The glossy photography is stunning and Kilmer's implausible accents are fun.
05/20/08
Top Critic Top Critic
Kilmer slips in and out of a series of ludicrously elaborate disguises, some more convincing than others, while poor Shue shuffles through the role of a sexy, book-reading babe pretending to be a dowdy lady scientist in kneesocks.
05/20/08
A generic suspenser that doesn't taste bad at first bite but becomes increasingly hard to swallow.
05/20/08
Top Critic
This insufferable romance-adventure includes vague comedy as well as unintentional humor, and its target audience seems to be preadolescents who won't notice the calculated enthusiasm with which it sidesteps sexuality.
05/20/08
There was enough in the movie for me to watch and somewhat enjoy it the whole way through.
08/18/06
What could have been a cool concept movie buckles under an uninspired script and some treacherous miscasting.
12/06/05
Nothing in the film really makes any sense, and all the other characters seem buffoonish and arch, overplayed to the point of farce, more Matt Helm than James Bond.
01/29/05
The film works, thanks to Noyce's skill in creating suspense and staging elaborate action scenes.
05/22/03
The predictable action-thriller elements are all in place, from coke-sniffing, machine-gun-toting thugs to monotonous narrow escapes. The look is stylish, sound is above average, and the acting only as good as it has to be.
05/14/03
The story that screenwriters Jonathan Hensleigh and Robert S. Baker have concocted keeps bogging down in silly contradictions or cliches.
10/15/02
Reinvention in the hands of Hollywood is seldom cause for celebration.
06/26/02
There isn't a contemporary film actor more crafty than Val Kilmer -- or one who reveals less of his true self. That's why Kilmer is so perfectly cast as Simon Templar, the master thief and elusive disguise artist of The Saint.
06/18/02
The script is a mixed bag of elaborate and unnecessary pseudo-politics, intriguing ideas and mostly confusing rehashed romantic mishmash.
06/05/02
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