johno-21 Review of The Legend of 1900

The Legend of 1900 (1998)

They should scraped the barnacles off instead of cutting 37 minutes

[6/10 · 28 February 2006]

I saw this in the theater in 2001 but for it's US theatrical distribution this film was cut from it's original 160 minute run time to 123 minutes. I see here that a lot of people enjoyed this film which I found to be good but not excellent as many viewed it to be. With a film directed by Giuseppe Tornatore of Cinema Paradiso fame and music from the great Ennio Morricone and the interesting storyline I felt this would be a good film to see but I ended up a little disappointed with the film. We never really learn how with no tutelage Novecento becomes the legendary pianist of the ocean. Presumably as some savant skill he was gifted with that listening to pianists play in the ship's ballroom as he grew up he picked it up without training or the ability to read music. The character is pretty dull despite growing up among hardened seafaring men of the boiler room and below deck and being exposed to high society above deck but I suppose one would possibly be kind of one dimensional if they lived on a single ship their entire lives never setting foot on land. Tim Roth is Novecento. Roth looks stiff in the title role. Despite being in a few hit movies like Reservoir Dogs, Pulp Fiction, Rosencrantz and Guilderstern Are Dead and Vincent and Theo earlier in his many films career he seems to have appeared in far more less memorable films including this one. Pruit Taylor Vince has the same career problem. Despite being in JFK, Mississippi Burning, Barfly and Natural Born Killers earlier in his career he also seems to get cast more forgettable ones than memorable ones. both Roth and Vince turn in stiff acting performances here. Clarence Williams III, best known as Linc from the old TV show Mod Squad plays Jelly Roll Morton. Morton was Creole from Louisiana who had mixed race blood but he didn't look black and looked more French so from a historical perspective as this film weaves an actual historical figure into it's fable, Williams is miscast. Williams by the way is pretty stiff himself in this film. The romantic angle in the film never really catches fire and the film has very little drama. This film looks good, has a mildly interesting story and a great soundtrack but despite it 40 years of trans Atlantic crossings it never really goes anywhere. I would give this a 6.0 of a possible 10 but wouldn't see it again.