HIGHLANDER (1986)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *fair*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *adventure*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *metaphysical*

It's not a very profound observation, but upon re-watching HIGHLANDER for the first time in many years, the main thought I had was that I could see how well director Russell Mulcahy and his crew made the film's budget of 19 million dollars seem like a much more expensive production. But most of the fight-scenes weren't much better choreographed than those of a decent swashbuckler, and there are only a handful of scenes that required expensive animation effects, mostly connected to the events of "the Quickening." Possibly audiences in 1986 wanted something with more bells and whistles, since HIGHLANDER was not a success. The original film only became a cult hit thanks to home video, resulting in three bad movie sequels and a much more enjoyable teleseries.

Just about everyone knows the broad strokes (sorry) of the myth, which are told in flashbacks from the main, contemporary tale. Sixteenth-century Scots "highlander" Connor MacLeod (Christopher Lambert) is slain in battle by a foreign enemy, the Kurgan (Clancy Brown). However, Connor rises from the dead, his wounds completely healed. His kinsmen think him possessed by a devil and exile him, though the confused man manages to wander far afield and find a home where no one knows of his strange circumstances. A Spaniard named Ramirez (Sean Connery) informs Connor that he belongs to a race of immortals, all of whom are born of mortal parents but who cannot die unless their heads are cut off. Even though immortals are as rare as one in a million, some among that number, such as the Kurgan, immediately seek out other immortals to kill them. "There can be only one" is their philosophy, and this would make sense if we were dealing with something like Freud's primal horde, where a tyrant-father makes certain he alone is able to propagate his line. However, Greg Widen's script makes clear that immortals cannot beget children-- though HIGHLANDER's ending includes a pay-off not present in the mythos of the TV show, as I recall.

As noted above, all this backstory is interpolated into the story of 20th-century Connor, who lives in New York under another name. For the first time in several years, he's challenged by a sword-wielding immortal, but Connor happens to have his own blade with him, and he kills his assailant. Local cops suspect Connor of the killing but can't prove it, though a police forensics expert named Brenda (Roxanne Hart) seeks to learn more about the reticent fellow. Her kindled interest parallels that of the Kurgan, who's been off doing whatever for the past four hundred years, and who suddenly decides to go after the One That Got Away. 

Though the 1986 scenes are a necessary evil, I found myself bored with most of them. The romance-arc between Connor and Brenda is the same, a colorless union thanks to a lack of chemistry between Lambert and Hart. The modern-day Kurgan is too much the "barbarian out of his element" to pose a credible threat, even though Ramirez (killed by the Kurgan back in the 16th century) told Connor that Kurgan posed some existential danger to the whole world if he was left to be the final immortal. In contrast, all the scene in which Connor is anywhere but in modern times are quite enjoyable, particularly a WWII in which Connor rescues and adopts an orphan. This adoptive daughter is an aging woman in Connor's service by 1986, and I suspect her character disappears from all later iterations.

Another thing that later stories had to change is the idea that Kurgan has succeeded in killing all other immortals but Connor. This was necessary to make the climactic struggle bracing, but it made sequels unworkable if Connor was the only one. So the later tales just ignored that idea, as well as the notion that the last immortal is rewarded by losing his immortality.

HIGHLANDER is a good basic action-film, and it deserves credit for a novel concept, though I felt the teleseries executed the concept's appeal better than the movie did. Lambert became a Big Name Adventure Star thanks to the movie, but I don't think he ever again got a role quite as demanding.