Welshrogue

In the future, the world will be threatened by the Ultimate Evil, and a cab driver will become important in the search for an ultimate weapon to defend Earth.

In a movie written and directed by Luc Besson, the future world is stylish, fashionable, and more than a little crowded. Buildings shoot up several hundred floors into the sky between which traffic drives, or rather flys at many different heights. Among these vehicles is a yellow taxi cab driven by Korben Dallas. Mr Dallas is a retired special forces soldier who now drives a taxi cab for a living. Bruce Willis is Dallas Korben. Aiding the Ultimate Evil is Jean-Baptiste Emanuel Zorg, or Mr Zorg to those who know him. Played by Gary Oldman, Zorg is a wonderfully over the top bad guy. Imagine Alan Rickman without the accent, mixed with a little craziness. Mr Zorg is attempting to furnish the coming Evil with the ultimate weapon. Trying to stop him is Father Vito Cornelius, played with a comical twist by Ian Holm (in his second movie featuring a role named Dallas. In Alien, his captain is called Dallas). Thrown into the mix is a DJ named Ruby Rhod, who is pretty much Prince in space. The sole female in this story is Leeloo, the ‘perfect’ being who falls into Dallas’s life, quite literally.

This movie looks very good. By 1997 computer graphics had improved to the point where you couldn’t ‘see the joins’ as it were and even today, the movie effects still look very good. Jean-Paul Gaultier was responsible for costume design and it shows. There has been some thought as to what the characters wear, as compared to some movie where it seems to be the last thing dealt with.

This is a fun movie. The heroes are cool, the bad guys over the top evil, the action is big and brash, the music futuristic. What more could you ask from a science fiction movie that doesn’t take itself too seriously but still produces a good looking movie.