King Solomon's Mines

This is a sprawling (4 hours) remake of the Rider Haggard story, with the usual added female and an extraneous subplot with Russian soldiers seeking a "Stone of Power" buried along with the treasure of King Solomon. It's very well shot, giving a vivid sense of the wide open spaces of Africa, and very well acted. Patrick Swayze is an excellent Alan Quatermain, and Allison Doody is attractive as Elizabeth Maitland, who hires Quatermain to help rescue her father. Sidede Onyulo as Umbopa, Gavin Hood as McNabb and the leader of the Russian soldiers (not named in IMDb's listing) are also memorable. For all that Hollywood can't leave a good story alone when they adapt it, this one is well told and, except that it's too long, I enjoyed it. 6/10.

I thought of the film as way too long and quite boring as there didn't really happened much in almost three hours compared to the 1985 movie version with Richard Chamberlain. If you are in to Africa, then you might like the film as there is a lot of nice footage of it. Patrick Swayze is as always his own stiff self, but the beautiful Alison Doody does a great role, or so I think, it doesn't really matter as she is extremely, ridiculously good looking. As for the purpose of the film I don't know. Why make TV-films that really don't give you much of a thrill as it has been shown that it is possible to do them with a bit more content. You who love movies like Indiana Jones or Lara Croft and think this will be anything like those movies will be disappointed...

If you a purist, don't waste your time - otherwise, hold onto your hat and enjoy the adventure. I loved the Stewart Granger/Deborah Kerr version - I've seen it dozens of times, but this film is every bit as good, only different. I won't detail the differences because it would spoil the film. Also, it is a pleasure to see Alison Doody again (I'm a huge Indiana Jones fan), Patrick Swayze is good as Quatermain, and the supporting cast is superb. I find the quality of the supporting cast one of the trademarks of a Hallmark Production and this film was no exception. The cinematography is splendid and the score is perfect. If you are looking for entertainment, you won't be disappointed.

There's nothing really wrong with this version of King Solomon's Mines. There really isn't. It follows the events of the original novel rather faithfully, yet still changes things where needed to keep the story flowing in this different medium.

Though yes, I would prefer that Allan Quatermain, a character noted almost solely for his marksmanship, would actually connect with a bullet at least once, but other than that, the characters are fine. The sets and locations are also suitably varied and impressive-looking, the music is not awful and as far as TV movies go, the action scenes could be a lot worse. Though yes, actually hitting stuff seems to be something of a problem.

But, the biggest problem is that it's a TV movie. As thus, the plot absolutely crawls forward. With emphasis on crawls. I get that they didn't have a budget to do anything really outlandish and that it needs to be of certain length, but come on... something needs to happen for the majority of time.

I honestly think this would have been a better experience if I hadn't sat through it in one sitting. At almost three hours it's way too long for any viewer to keep up his or her interest from start to finish. In the end that means that King Solomon's Mines falls just short of being average, but is by no means a movie you shouldn't check out if you're interested.

Watched both parts twice. Enjoyed the story and enjoyed seeing an older Patrick Swayze as the hero. He was very believable as the hunter Alan Quartermaine and certainly bested the performance of Richard Chamberlain. I do admit that I would have preferred seeing someone else as the "Lady in Distress". Alison Doody should stick with modern and not period pieces. She didn't have the look of the woman of the 1800's. The rest of the cast were terrific and followed the plotlines very well. I am glad to see that the actors of this generation are not afraid to try on different characters and are not afraid to be seen as getting older. Age is inevitable, but let's not hide from it. A man at 50+ can be much sexier (and , Patrick truly is sexy) then a green youth, no matter how pretty. Hoorah for character lines to go along with a great smile.