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The Return Of Captain Invincible
[Elite Entertainment]
1983; color
Directed by Philippe Mora
Starring: Alan Arkin, Christopher Lee, Kate Fitzpatrick & Bill Hunter
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Sometimes I just don't know what I'm setting myself up for when I volunteer to review a DVD. Case in point: The Return Of Captain Invincible. The description sparked my interest, but the real hook was the presence of Christopher Lee, as I am on a self-appointed mission to eventually see every film in which he appeared. The plot revolves around Alan Arkin—clearly at an all-time career low here—as a former superhero, Captain Invincible. It seems the Captain (who helped save America by smashing the Nazis in WWII, among other fabulously heroic deeds) was brought in front of the McCarthy Commission only a few short years later to respond to accusations of collaborating with communists. This slap in the face drove the Captain not only out of sight but into a multi-decade alcoholic tailspin that (somehow) left him drunk and disorderly in the gutters of Sydney, Australia. Now, some 30 years later, America needs him back to find a stolen "hypno ray" which essentially renders it's victims into a willing state of suggestion; in other words, anything they're told, they'll willingly do—without question. The man behind all this is Mr. Midnight (Christopher Lee), arch-nemesis of the good Captain. Much of this tedious and silly (as in not funny) filmic exercise involves the Captain making generally futile and bungling attempts to regain his superpowers. And, of course, trying to stop the bad guy and save the world. Aside from Arkin's fight with a renegade vacuum cleaner hose that's almost a complete rip-off of Bela Lugosi wrestling with the rubber octopus in Bride Of The Monster, there's really only one other notable "highlight": Christopher Lee singing. That's right, Christopher Lee sings in this movie. Now that you've collected your jaw from the floor, I'll give you the lowdown on the one detail I neglected to mention earlier—The Return Of Captain Invincible is a musical. (Songs courtesy Richard O'Brien, better known as Riff Raff from Rocky Horror; for which he also wrote the songs. In fact, some of the songs even sound like reworkings of some of the numbers from Rocky Horror.) Truthfully Lee's two songs, particularly the one where he's surrounded by evil go-go babes that comes off looking like a bizarre twist on something out of Elvis'1968 Comeback Special (if it was set in the world of the first Austin Powers movie), are worth the price of admission alone. The second of his two numbers, the one about booze, is as ideally suited for the band Alcoholics Unanimous as any cover they've ever done and only they have the potential to do any justice to what would otherwise be a musical turd. I can't honestly recommend this for any of the right reasons, in fact I can barely—and I mean JUST barely— recommend it for the wrong ones, but if this review has whetted your appetite I say water that desire with a couple adult beverages before viewing this one.
—the Kommandant
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