re:mote voices

Title: Thunderbirds
Cast: Brady Corbet, Bill Paxton, Anthony Edwards, Ben Kingsley, Sopia Lyles
Director: Jonathan Frakes

Hollywood is notorious for it’s adaptation of what it regards as hot “property”, which usually garners criticism. The adaptation of Gerry Anderson’s classic puppet series Thunderbirds, featuring a team that provides an international rescue service, is no exception. The most obvious criticisms of Thunderbirds has been the idea that it is dumbing down the concept. Also it has been suggested that it has more to do with the success of the recent Spy Kids franchise. Both of these are valid comments – especially when the premise of the film version is that the adults are incapacitated, leaving the children to save the day. Even then the idea has potential, world crisis, the heroes out of circulation, the next generation forced to step in.

However, as light as the characterisation is, the Tracey family who make up the members of Thunderbirds are not very likeable. Alan Tracey, the youngest of the family, is frustrated that he is stuck in school while his brothers and father are out saving the world. The kind of arrogance and cockiness he displays he obviously gets from the rest of the family, as they swagger about and seem to boast with every word just how cool and accomplished they are. Ironically the only member of the Tracey family that seems at all affable, is the one that they have banished to space.

A further irony is that the evil Hood, the villain of the piece uses Thunderbird Five – the space station – as the target which traps the Thunderbirds. The space station is attacked – the rest of the crew blast off to the rescue, but become trapped. Leaving the Hood free to take over their secret island. But he hasn’t taken into account the children – the youngest Tracey, Alan, along with Fermat, the son of Brains, and Tintin the daughter of the Tracey’s servants.

As I’ve said already Alan Tracey is something of a jerk, full of his own importance in a practically dictatorial fashion. Luckily Fermat and Tintin are more interesting characters and go some way to balancing the film. One would have thought that casting Bill Paxton as the head of the family would have been a smart move, but in reality he doesn’t come across well. Ben Kingsley as the Hood on the other is much more effective as the villain of the piece, as is the casting of his two bumbling henchmen. Anthony Edwards as the stuttering Brains is also another well placed actor, the scene where he faces off against the Hood having a particularly strong dynamic. The casting of Lady Penelope was one that I had mixed feelings about, though I suspect that the quibbles I had weren’t really down to Sophia Myles herself; on the other hand Parker along with the Hood, is probably one of the most uncanny pieces of casting in the form of Ron Cook.

Of course part of what makes the Thunderbirds as a concept as well as a team of rescuers is the technology. As such the film is filled with replicas of the space ships and other vehicles which made up the classic TV series – which is probably where the film remains truest to the source material. As well as to the decision to particularly target the film to children, which the director talks about in interviews – the vehicles are chunky and brightly coloured, giving them what is perceived to be particular kid appeal. Strangely the only vehicle which didn’t work as well, for me at least, was Lady Penelope’s big pink car – possibly because it was the one you saw in the most mundane of contexts, so it looked most out of place.

Overall I can see how Thunderbirds could have worked, though there is no denying that I was, on the whole, disappointed. I would like to say that Fermat and Tintin, and Brains and the Hood saved the film, but I can’t really go that far, as much of a difference as they did make.