The Avengers movie

The second most remarkable thing about the film version of the 1960s TV series The Avengers is the way it accumulated bad reviews from critics who hadn't actually seen it yet. That's the penalty for not inviting them to private screenings, I suppose.

The most remarkable thing about The Avengers, though, is its surprising fidelity to the spirit and look of the original. I went into the theater expecting a typical Hollywood summer action flick with a couple of characters in it who happened to be named John Steed and Emma Peel. What I got instead was an atypical action film with most of the wit, whimsy, and tongue-in-cheek attitude of the TV Avengers intact.

Director Jeremiah Chechik brings a refreshing blend of style and silliness to the proceedings. The scene in which the directors of an evil syndicate are all disguised with colorful teddy bear costumes, for example, could have easily come from the original show; ditto the attack by giant robot hornets. And I'm not even going to address the fanciful sets; you've just got to see them.

Writer Don MacPherson has produced a script that's both witty and relatively subtle, words you usually don't associate with adventure films these days. Steed and Peel have lots of raised-eyebrow dialog, laced with that low-level sexual tension typical of their interactions lo those many years ago.

That sexual tension becomes, alas, rather less low level during one brief (but quite modest) scene near the end of the film. That's Hollywood for you, I guess.

Ralph Finnes' Steed is more physically combative than Patrick Macnee's avuncular original (you do not want to get in the way of this Steed's umbrella), and leavens the character's "Rule Britannia" jauntiness with some post-colonial irony. Likewise, Uma Thurman's Dr. Emma Peel is somewhat more sleek than chic and, as her title indicates, even more her own woman than Diana Rigg's original.

No, she's not Diana Rigg. But even Diana Rigg isn't that particular Diana Rigg any more. The important thing is that both actors have the core of the characters down pat, and their by-play is a major part of the story.

Old Avengers fans will also appreciate Patrick Macnee's amusing cameo role. And admirers of Sean Connery will get a kick out of his cheerfully over-acted Sir August De Winter, bent on becoming the Bill Gates of meterology by cornering the world market on weather.

The bottom line is that this old Avengers fan - along with the three others who accompanied him - found the Avengers movie an entertaining surprise. We all had quibbles with bits of it, but color us satisfied on the whole.

I'm even hoping for a sequel.

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