Year of the Comet

Far be it from me to disparage anything written by the great William Goldman, revered novelist ("The Princess Bride," "Marathon Man") and screenwriter ("Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid," "All the President's Men," the film versions of both of the afore-mentioned novels). That said, however, I'm sure I don't know how Goldman could have coughed up a stone like "Year of the Comet," reportedly a passion project that grew out of Goldman's status as an oenophile.

The titular year is 1811; it was, evidently, and to borrow a phrase from the old song, "A very good year," at least in terms of wine. Though made in 1992, "The Year of the Comet" feels like one of those dreadful high-concept 1980s films, though it also clearly owes quite a lot of the screwball comedies of the 1940s.

Alas, the vintage more favored by this movie is the '80s, the decade that brought us gems... er, not!... like "Mannequin," "The Money Pit," "Weekend At Bernies," "Hello Again," and other utterly absurdities that attempted to superimpose spoof onto more serious filmic structures. What we have here is a chase movie in which two gorgeous (and seemingly indestructible) people -- Penelope Ann Miller's Margaret, a wine specialist, and Tim Daly's Oliver, an action man with the skills of a commando and a bad back -- pursue a bottle of wine once owned by Napoleon. It's a bottle that could bring in a million dollars or more at auction, but the bad guys who are also interested in acquiring it aren't interested in rare vintages; what they're after is a chemical formula that could change the world.

As far as set-ups and MacGuffins go, this was pretty tired stuff even in the '80s. Attempts to spice things up -- with a scheming Scottish hotelier, a romantic attraction that flourishes despite his arrogance and her ambitions as a woman professional, a wild chase in small plane, a lumbering psychotic killer, and a suave band of thugs -- simply serve to stack on more and more cheese, none of which disguises a lack of credible storytelling and some truly terrible dialogue. I looked to Julie Kirgo's liner notes to provide a rationale for this release -- she's always able to make an intelligent, entertaining case -- but even here (the Twilight Time Blu-ray's sole extra, aside from the music track and theatrical trailer, if those truly qualify as extras) I wasn't able to find anything convincing.

There is an upside, though: The film looks terrific, from its clutch of locales (Scottish highlands, the French Riviera) to its stars (Daly as leading man makes for great eye candy). Twilight Time does its usual bang-up job with the 1080p hi-def transfer, and for those who like Hummi Mann's score there's that other TT hallmark, the isolated music track. Maybe I just saw one too many films of this ilk back in the day, but -- sad to say -- this film (which I was excited to see due to my own love of a good bottle of red) hardly lives up to its promise. Go uncork a Blu-ray of "Tu Seras Mon Fils" or "Sideways" instead.