Brenda Starr

This expensive film version of the long-running comic strip by Dale Messick may have languished on the shelf long than any other major studio film in the last 20 years. Completed in '86, it had a run outside the U.S. in 1989 but didn't show up on these shores until 1992, and it really wasn't worth the wait. Sumptuously photographed by Freddie Francis and generally well cast, it's the poor direction and undeveloped scripting that make this perhaps the worst live-action film adaptation of a comic

The first 20 minutes have some funny moments of deliberate camp & there are a couple of good stunts later in the film but instead of continuing to have campy fun with the conventions of old comic strips, it commits to trying to get laughs by recreating 2 very old comedy styles - slapstick & screwball - & badly at that. It's painful to watch. The idea of having reality collide with the comic is "meta" & interesting but nothing funny comes of it, & so it just makes the film seem messy too.

This movie isn't great, but it doesn't deserve the bashing (and low box office return) it received. Take it as a fun and light comic book-come-to-life movie, and you should have a good time.