Review of Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves (1991) by Compi24 — 17 Jul 2019

Oh, man.

Anyone who looks to this film as the bar for which all other Robin Hood adaptations have to measure up to should take a lap. Or maybe a few laps. What an unmitigated mess. "Robin Hood: Prince Of Thieves" incorporates every bad trope, gimmick, and studio miscue that defined the issues with what would become 1990's filmmaking. It's a tonal mish-mash of bad, half-attempts at accents, uninspired sub-plotting, all-over-the-place character work, random-ass fish-eyed close-ups, and Bryan Adams music. What's more, it's long, sitting pretty at an unforgivable two and half hours in length. Boy, oh, boy. Why didn't I hate this? Did it have something to do with Alan Rickman's desperate attempts at injecting life into this otherwise lifeless cash grab? It might've. Are the action scenes watchable, for the most part? Yeah, they are. But other than these two aspects, I cannot believe what we -- the moviegoing public -- fell for back in 1991. $390 million. My God. We were practically asking for "Waterworld" to happen four years later from the same director/actor pairing.