Mon 24 Jan 2011
A Movie Review by David L. Vineyard: MY NAME IS MODESTY (2004).
Posted by Steve under Action Adventure movies , Reviews[13] Comments
MY NAME IS MODESTY. Miramax, 2004. Alexandra Staden. Raymond Cruz, Fred Pearson, Eugenia Yuan, Nicolaj Coster Waldau. Screenplay by Lee Batchler & Janet Scott Batchler, based on the characters created by Peter O’Donnell and “In the Beginning,” the Modesty Blaise comic strip by Peter O’Donnell & James Holdway. Directed by Scott Spiegel.
The history of this one isn’t very promising — Quentin Tarantino had acquired the rights to film the character of Modesty Blaise from the comic strip and novels by Peter O’Donnell, and in order to keep them he needed to get something on film. As a result he produced this made for DVD release feature as a sort of prequel to a real film.
The good news is that it is better than any previous Modesty Blaise film or television appearance, and better than it had to be.
In fact, for now, it is the definitive Modesty Blaise on screen. The story takes place before Modesty meets Willie Garvin, and before she became the “Mam’zelle,” mistress of the criminal organization known as the Network. This is very much the story of how she came to hold such a position.
The film is short and the story succinct. Modesty Blaise (Alexandra Staden) is in Tangier working at the casino owned by her criminal mentor, the head of the Network. As the film opens he is planning a major drug deal (despite Modesty’s disapproval) and as a result the vault at the casino is filled with money.
Myklos, (Nicolaj Coster-Waldau), a charismatic young terrorist with a grudge against her boss, kills him and takes over the casino after closing time taking Modesty and a handful of employees hostage.
To keep herself and the other hostages alive, Modesty convinces Myklos that they must wait for her bosses second in command (Raymond Cruz from TNT’s The Closer) to return to open the safe, and engages him at the roulette wheel and in a desperate ploy: for every game he wins she will tell another chapter of her life beginning with how she came to be named Modesty Blaise, and for every three in a row she wins he will let a hostage free.
Thus Modesty reveals the story of her origins as an orphan in war-torn Bosnia (updated from the original post WW II era) and how she met Lodz, the old man who became her teacher and traveling companion. As the suspenseful cat and mouse game proceeds Modesty carefully plays Myklos and reveals her compelling story from how she wandered over Southern Europe and North Africa to how she became involved with the Network after the old man’s death when she was caught stealing in the bazaars of Tangiers by her mentor in crime.
Done on a small budget and with mostly unknown actors, this shouldn’t work, but ironically those things become virtues, and while Staden is too slight to really capture the Modesty of the comic strip and books, she has the exotic look, Khirghiz eyes, and screen presence to suggest both the complexity and strength of the character, and when at the end she rips off her skirt in the true Modesty style to go into action, the well-choreographed fight could have been story boarded from the panels drawn by artist James Holdway.
Modesty wins the day, and even offers an ironic thank you to the dead Myklos, who has inadvertently delivered the Network into her hands. She cancels the drug deal, and informs her now second in command that they will deal with the problems that causes when it comes. The film ends as the legend is born.
There is a nice touch, too, as one of the hostages, the bartender, who has overheard her life story as she recounted it to Myklos to stall him, asks her just how much of what she told them was true.
With a Giaconda smile she replies: My name is Modesty.
After the awful Joseph Losey film with Monica Vitti and Terence Stamp as Modesty and Willie, and the misguided television pilot designed to move the characters to California with Ann Turkel miscast, it is nice to finally see a respectful and intelligent adaptation of O’Donnell’s popular cult favorite.
My Name is Modesty is nothing more than an appetizer, but as such it does what a good appetizer is designed for and whets the appetite for the main course.
Even if the main course never comes, this remains a faithful and heartfelt tribute to the real thing and the DVD includes a nice making of video, insightful audio commentary by the screenwriters, director, and producer, a video interview with the late Peter O’Donnell on the creation of Modesty, and an illustrated retrospective of all her comic strip adventures replete with detailed synopsis.
All in all this is a class act all the way, like the lady it celebrates. It is the real Modesty Blaise, and that’s all any of her fans have ever asked for.
January 25th, 2011 at 1:57 am
Thanks for the recommendation. I have ordered it, since I love the novels (I even admired Stamp in the Joseph Losey “mod” version, though Vitti was awful).
I remember reading a vicious review of this newer version when it came out. It seems to me it was barely shown in the L.A. area. I’m looking forward to seeing it now.
January 25th, 2011 at 10:13 am
The movie gets only 4.5 stars (out of 10) on IMDB, and some people leaving comments really trash it. Others praise it as highly as David does, with the same caveats he includes and which I’m sure are spot on accurate.
An appetizer waiting for the main course. Nicely said, and enough to convince me to order a copy too.
— Steve
January 25th, 2011 at 10:52 am
Hell, I managed to find some campy goodness in even such stepchildren of Ms. Blaise as the telefilm LOVELY BUT DEADLY, so how could I turn my back?
January 25th, 2011 at 11:33 am
I know some people find Losey’s Modesty Blaise worthwhile as a spoof (even calling it funny!) but I thought it beyond awful. Hideous. Heinous even. To me, the only thing remotely interesting about it was the art direction and the bizarre number of costume changes Vitti and Stamp go through. In one scene they start in one outfit, engage in a fight and then suddenly they are seen wearing completely different clothes and I think even the hair styles (or more wigs) have changed.
I had not known of this version until your review, David. Thanks for enlighteing me. It’s in my Netflix queue now.
January 25th, 2011 at 5:10 pm
The moment in the Losey film when Modesty and Willie started singing to each other during a gunfight was pretty much the low point of everyone concerned career, though the scene at the end when Dirk Bogarde is staked out in the Sahara calling for “Champagne, champagne …” has a bizarre sort of appeal.
That said, I thought everyone in it was awful including Stamp and the usually reliable Harry Andrews miscast as Sir Gerald Tarrant. The so called “look” of the film was garish and the usual bad sixties attempt at pop visuals. As a bad film it is right up there with the first CASINO ROYALE, BATMAN RETURNS, SUPERGIRL, and BATMAN AND ROBIN. At least SHOWGIRLS had unrelenting nudity and CAT WOMAN that final shot of Hallie Berry’s posterior as she walked on the top of the fence.
MY NAME IS MODESTY is not a big action spectacular, nor is it structured like one of O’Donnell’s books. It is a vignette from Modesty’s career pre Willie, and at the point she becomes Modesty Blaise. Keeping that in mind it respects the character, O’Donnell’s oveure, and on a minor budget with an unknown cast manages to outshine any previous attempt to do the character. It is very close to some of O’Donnell’s fine short stories about Modesty where he tries to do something differnt than the usual Modesty plot (which varies little in structure, but usually succeeds based on content and detail).
I think many fans of O’Donnell’s books and the comic strip will appreciate for what it is and I hope I have conveyed that. For anyone else, it is at best a minor low budget made for DVD film with a nice look and a couple of decent performances with some nice touches to the script.’
Now, let me be clear, for my taste this sort of property has to be done ‘straight.’ Tongue in cheek is fine, even encourtaged, but not CAMP (I didn’t even like THOUROUGHLY MODERN MILLIE save for Beatrice Lilly). Losey made Modesty into the television version of Batman with everything but the pop up sound effects and it didn’t work. Even great directors can make bad movies — look at John Ford’s SEVEN WOMEN or Hitchcock’s UNDER CAPRICORN.
This does work as a short, well concieved, and intriguing intro to Modesty. — it was never meant to be a big budget action film or to compete with them (and that’s what most of IMDB’s complaints review it as — and frankly if IMDB told me the sky was blue I’d seriously doubt them — they are a fine resource for detais facts and even plot synopis — usually —, but critically about as much use to a film lover as a blindfold).
I enjoyed this for what it was and for what it intended to do and succeeded at. I think most O’Donnell fans will enjoy it on that basis.
Meanwhile the closest thing to Modesty in a big screen box office outing on film is Angelina Jolie in films like SALT, WANTED, the LARA CROFT films, and her recent outing with Johnny Depp, Geena Davis in THE LAST KISS GOODBYE, LITTLE NIKITA, or any of a number of films like those inspired by Modesty to some extent.
But keep in mind watching this one it was only made to retain film rights to the character — that everyone involved put so much attention and love into it is a small miracle and should be appreciated by Modesty’s fans.
And if you don’t get a little frisson at the end when she says: “My name is Modesty,” you probably aren’t a Peter O’Donnell fan to begin with.
January 25th, 2011 at 9:36 pm
I am a huge O’Donnell fan and was pleased to see this movie as it succeeded in the ways mentioned and was not campy. However, I certainly didn’t believe Alexandra Staden as a combat master, not with those stick-like arms. And it’s too bad Nicolaj Waldau was a bad guy in this as I think he would be the perfect Willie Garvin.
January 26th, 2011 at 2:02 am
Staden did lack the physical presence to be Modesty, but since she wasn’t asked to do a lot in that department (for most of the film she is a war orphan and waif and Staden’s stature fits the part), and the one fight was choreographed as if it was story boarded from a sequence drawn by James Holdway, I squinted a bit and worked hard on my willing suspension of disbelief just for the good will the film earned.
Even with Staden’s frail physique, the fight was well shot and staged
I found it well directed and written, and thought it looked great, and there are a couple of well done scenes — I loved the touch when Modesty — who has just inherited the Network, thanks to Waldau’s crime ‘thanks’ his corpse impaled on the roulette wheel’s center spoke — a pure O’Donnell touch.
Waldau was good, but no Willie. In fact Willie may well prove impossible to cast. He’s easily the most vivid character in the books and in some ways more fully developed than Modesty. I’m willing to give much more leeway to casting her than him.
Some characters are like that. Good as Timothy Hutton was I don’t think anyone has ever quite captured Archie Goodwin (Hutton came closest, and likely will be the best in the final judgement) even when they get Wolfe right. And while a few of the screen Mike Hammer’s are good none of the Velda’s or Pat Chambers ever seemed right to me.
I fear Willie may be one of those characters who just doesn’t translate to the screen.
In any case I suspect it would be impossible for any team of actors to capture the unique relationship between Modesty and Willie even if you could find two actors, a screenwriter, and a director who understood it. The impossibly intimate but entirely non sexual nature of the relationship works in the comic strip and the books, but it would be tough to pull off on screen.
January 27th, 2011 at 4:45 pm
Thanks for the insightful review, David. Aa a longtime Modesty fan I’m just glad this film exists, slight though it may be. Considering the circumstances behind its being made in the first place, it turned out far better than my limted expectations of it. While I’d obviously like to see a big-budget adaptation of ‘Sabretooth’ or ‘A Taste for Death’, if this is all we ever get, then I’ll take it over Joseph Losey’s travesty any day of the week. I’ll always curse Losey for screwing up his version, if he’d made it ‘right’ we could’ve had a franchise every bit as long-running as Bond, the source material being stronger and richer (in my opinion).
January 27th, 2011 at 8:13 pm
Modesty and Willie probably have the most undeveloped potential for a film franchise of any property out there, but the chances of everything coming right for that is pretty small. I’d be happy with one or two good films.
February 9th, 2012 at 3:29 am
“Modesty and Willie probably have the most undeveloped potential for a film franchise of any property out there.” Now that is an understatement…
If I had to cast right now (2012) for a Big Budget movie, I’d pick Angelina Jolie and Daniel Craig as the leads, with Ian McKellen as Sir Gerald and Christopher Walken as Gabriel (assuming you’d want that particular “baddie”; you could also adapt some of the weird henchmen from the other stories as his aides). Sets would, of course, be international in scope (London, New York, Cairo etc etc). But who would direct??
October 29th, 2012 at 3:26 am
Hopefully, the success of Sam Mendes’ fabulous Skyfall will ignite Tarantino’s appetite to do something with the greatest action thrillers ever written.
Even the casting is obvious – Jennifer Atherton as Blaise. Jason Statham as Garvin.
For God’s sake, get it done. We’ve waited long enough!
February 17th, 2021 at 4:05 pm
Absolutely with Statham. Do you mean Gemma Atherton?
February 17th, 2021 at 4:17 pm
Maybe Gemma Arterton ??