Unattractive Elements

Rating: 4/10 (7 May 1999)

Brendan Fraser is wonderful in what is essentially another comic book role, his own charm and sweetness managing to overpower some truly unpleasant distractions in the script. Although the special effects are occasionally cheesy and threadbare by current standards, they are generally effective and do not distract from the fun. What does spoil the movie, however, is the implicit racism in the film. I was particularly bothered by the stereotyping of Arabs as dirty and stupid. Certainly, this is a kind of anti-Semitism the world could do well enough without --- and so could this movie.