The Four Feathers: Review By B. Alan Orange

Code Orange Alert #39145: Four Feathers

My next clever invention will look like a backpack, yet serve as a foot guillotine that conveniently slips over my chair and lops off the ankles of any potential seat kicker unfortunate enough to sit behind me. For God's sake, people! How bloody hard is it to keep your shoes on the floor? I'm there, trying my hardest to focus on this dusty Byzantine gift, and your bucking the base of my headboard every two seconds. Are you five? No, you're forty. Yet, you have no manners. Do you somehow think I enjoy your rudeness? Yeah, about as much as I enjoyed this boring ride through the Sudan desert. Cut it out!

I'm guessing, after glancing at its poster, that Sweet Home Alabama is about nothing more than Reese Witherspoon's enormous forehead. That's entertainment! Of course, I thought the same thing about A Knight's Tale and Heath Ledger. What's up with these looming, thirty-story visages that decorate our town like some odd sort of warning? They tell me absolutely nothing about whatever movie their trying to promote. Instead, they cold-c*ck me with some twat's giant chin. It's cause enough to crash my car into any given bus stop. Whoever designs these One-Sheets nowadays aren't putting any effort into the art form. No one, except maybe a Witherspoon-worshipping sadist, is going to frame the poster for Sweet Home Alabama and hang it in their office or home. What happened to telling a story in a single image? What happened to the works of Drew Struzen? Why am I suddenly enveloped in this awful cult of personality whenever I walk down the corridor of my local multiplex? Sure, one celebrity's image can sell a film...But come on, just a giant picture of their face with nothing else to go on? And that's for every Tom Cruise movie that's hit in the last six years. I'm one hundred percent certain that even the actors don't dig this move. Let's look at the Four Feathers poster; it has little more than face value going for it. It tells me nothing except that Goldie Hawn's daughter is whoring two of Hollywood's secondary leading men in an attempt to wear a corset. And, yeah, there are some ant-like armies in the back ground...

Not familiar with the novel it's based on, which was published in 1902; I knew nothing about The Four Feathers. The trailer came across rather vague in its telltale signs of entertainment. Basically, I get that this is about a love triangle, and that it's dressed up in a Knott's Berry Farm novelty photo-op wardrobe. Aside from that, I was quite oblivious to its worded strength in story structure.

Well, it's based on a classic. This is the type of film that will get shown in 9th Grade literature class under the tutelage of a substandard substitute teacher who has no real ambitions to teach at all. It feels like homework. Heck, I actually thought about reading the book just to get out of seeing the movie, but that's a role reversal I wasn't yet ready for. I don't rightly care what type of tale is locked in some hundred-year-old tomb. Reading fiction has never been my cup of tea. Chapters stretched about the length of the Sudan desert are sure to do me in, as are their cinematic counterparts. This movie is impeccable. The acting is superb, the direction is top notch, and the plot is a literary achievement. Still, it's the type of work I happen to find dirt-dry and boring. The Four Feathers had me squirming in my seat; proof-positive that I shouldn't be reviewing movies. But, heck...Who else are they going to get to do it? My eyes teared-up and my legs grew numb. Through about fifty-five minutes of its illustrious middle, all I could think about was what type of sandwich I'd be getting at Subway when it was over...

The detailed narrative centers on two chums in the British army, both of whom are smitten with Kate Hudson. Frankly, ever since she married that skinny hippie from the Black Crows, I haven't really been able to look at her in a lustful manner. But Heath Ledger and Wes Bentley don't seem to care about the various types of diseased dick that have penetrated this junked-up tart's body. They dig her in a Civil War reenactment sort-of-way that would be hard to rectify in any other similarly themed movie. Speaking of which, this hits awfully close to January's Count of Monte Cristo, another flawless flick that lacked not one thing...Except a bit of excitement. Both projects rest on a parallel plane of existence. The only difference is that there, its two chums were at war with each other due to a bout of jealousy brought on by some FHM slut with a picnic basket. Here, Heath and Wes (finally ditching his cellophane fruit bag) remain friends, even though they both want to puncture the same vaginal wound.

You see; Kate only has eyes for Heath. She doesn't mind stringing Wes along, even after he has his corneas blown out. That's what girls do, especially when they know a guy is mad for their skin and kisses. I guess it gives them some kind of power, like an upper hand. This sucks for Wes, and I'll tell you why. Before he went blind, he knew what Hudson looked like. He has that mental picture of her. He knows she's a fox, and he could imagine those soft, porcelain cheeks whenever he goes to snog her out. If Heath gets the girl, Wes will have to look for someone else, someone new. How will he know she's not some Hatchet Face wannabe Xeroxed off a John Water's movie? At least Ledger still has his sight; he could capably pick a beauty on his own accord. Now, I know, Heath and Wes are still friends at the end of the movie. Heath could just tell Wes that any girl suitor is a beaut. Right? Wrong; any guy knows if you've got a blind friend, you're going to let him hump just about anything to get a good laugh.

Really, who cares what Kate wants?

Heath doesn't seem to. Days after getting engaged to Miss Penny Lane, he learns he's being shipped off to war. This part was a little hazy for me. I'm still not sure who they were going off to fight, or for what reason, but I didn't really care. The back of my hand held more enjoyment then most of the goings-on in this tiny stroll-by massacre. Anyway, Ledger decides he doesn't want to get lost in the battle. The tough bloke turns into a rancorous pussweeb, unable to look a good standoff in the eye. His friends all send him a white feather, which represents cowardice; a basic symbolic gesture ushered forth in a means to generate a plot. Poor Kate thinks he's ditching the trenches for her, but no...Big Dumbass has to open his mouth and tell her that even if she didn't exist, he'd still be bucking his post. To say the least, this irks the girl into giving him another white feather. The fourth one; completing his never-ending circle of shame. This painful nod sends the guy into a tailspin. He loses sight of his life, goes underground, disguises himself as an Arab, and tries to rectify his guilt with the help of Djimon Hounsou...

Basically, Heath's life story is a big mess, like most real bouts of accomplishment. We can contemplate what would have happened had he stayed in the army, all day, but what actually happens never seems right. The guy's destiny is out of whack, as are his friend's. Sure, he's still alive at the end of the day, but there's a possibility he would have been anyway. Personally, I think Wes wouldn't have lost his eyesight, but the friend Heath frees from a POW Camp would have probably died there. You can't really weigh those two options in your hand equally: A man's eyesight or another man's life? It's all of a sloppy, unpredictable nature that gives The Four Feathers a feeling of intimacy and accuracy that baffles the mind.

The film is devoid of any color except that of bright blood red, which is seen in practically every frame. Maybe it's there to symbolize the blood loss, or the love of country. I'm not too sure, and I don't feel like scrutinizing and contemplating this artistic decision. Personally, I found that it distracted from other elements of the story...Like, why is Heath Ledger always popping up in these period dramas? And can't Djimon Hounsou land any other role? Does he always have to look like he's rolled around in powdered sugar? Here's a Dude I'd like to see in clothes, just once. Can't y'all cast him as a lawyer, or something? Christ, the man's been covered in dirt ever since he rolled off that boat in Amistad.

Aside from one rather nice short sequence, where Heath tags his camel in the neck with a knife and then drinks blood from it like a canteen, I can't really say there's anything new or of interest laid forth in this British Blah-ma. It was slightly less painful than a paper cut to the eye, but at least that sudden injury makes you sit up and take notice. This had me trying to stay propped up in my chair.

Literature. I can't believe someone tried to base a movie on it. Now, if Kate Hudson had of torn off her top and rolled around in the sand for two minutes, I might have liked it a tiny bit more. But not much. Especially after Chris Robinson sticks his ugly mug in my head, drolly stating, "That's my wife. I tweak them nipples every night."

Eewww! Punishment, indeed.