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From: louns@uw-june (Michael Lounsbery)
Newsgroups: net.movies
Subject: Another view on _The_Emerald_Forest_ (spoiler)
Message-ID: <135@uw-june>
Date: Wed, 7-Aug-85 02:31:33 EDT
Article-I.D.: uw-june.135
Posted: Wed Aug  7 02:31:33 1985
Date-Received: Mon, 12-Aug-85 02:56:46 EDT
Organization: U of Washington Computer Science
Lines: 62

Having so far seen a fair number of positive reviews of _The_Emerald_Forest_,
I thought perhaps it was time to give my impressions of it.  I feel it was
inconsistent, often poorly acted, and, above all, hokey.

To begin with, I could never figure out what the film was trying to do.  If
it was an entertainment film, the ecological points about the disappearing
forests were out of place.  If the film was trying to drive home the point
about the tragedy of the Amazon's forests, the happy ending is definitely
off.  The viewer would have been much more impressed by the extinction of
to the "Invisible People," as was probably more likely than the too happy
ending presented.  Sure, a couple of the older members of the tribe died,
but the young ones, including the hero and heroine were there to take over
and live happily ever after.

Also inexplainable was the fact that next to no feeling is ever shown for
the "Fierce People" throughout the film.  From the start, they are portrayed
as evil people who deserve to die.  All right, they were pretty aggressive,
but nothing was made of the fact that, after all, their entire tribe (or at
least all the men) was wiped out by the very tribe portrayed as good.  For a
film supposedly concerned with the rights of the Indians in the Amazon, this
comes off smelling very bad.  The film was too matter-of-fact about the
killing of the first one by the kid's father, and also didn't seem to care
very much about the fate of the long-haired white guide who apparently was
eaten by the evil cannibals.

Another inconsistency was the father's actions toward the dam.  As soon as
he finds out destroying it has a chance of saving his son, he blows it up.
Come on!  The guy has been building this dam for 10 years, do you really
think he's just going to casually blow it up on the first advice of his son?
At least a little mental anguish about destroying his creation, and the
ensuing dilemma, is called for.  Such a subject was treated much better in
_The_Bridge_on_the_River_Kwai_.  It also seemed that more could have been
made of the city-dwelling "Bat People."  There was a tremendous chance to
build up the irony of their new life that was wasted.  Subjects like that
have been treated much better in Herzog films (to which _The_Emerald_Forest_
has been compared) such as _Where_the_Green_Ants_Dream.

As far as occasional bad acting, I really felt that the actress portraying
the kid's mother ruined every scene she was in.  She just didn't fit.  I
liked the guy who played Tomee's Indian father, but nobody else really stood
out.  (The guy playing Tommy's white father always looked like he was about
to kill the first person to talk, even when he wasn't toting his big black
machine gun.)

The main thing I really didn't like was how hokey the film really seemed.  A
white kid is kidnapped by Amazon Indians, and grows to be their chief at 17. 
This is the kind of stuff the National Enquirer writes about!  Although the
film takes itself very seriously, right from the start everything is just
too melodramatic.  There were too many scenes that were surely intended to
be serious that actually had most of the theater laughing at them for the
unbelievability of the way they were presented.

I guess I might as well be fair and say what I did like.  The photography
was great, with magnificent air shots of the forest, which truly was an
emerald in color.  Also, the action really starts to pick up near the end,
even making the movie fun for about 20 minutes (even though the action
consists of wiping out the evil "Fierce People" and the horribly crude white
guys who supply them with weapons).

_The_Emerald_Forest_ had some really good potential, but just couldn't put
it all together to come up with a memorable and lasting film.  I'd give it a
rating of *1/2, maybe ** if you don't mind hokeyness.