VividSimon Simply Perfect

Spidersecu Don't Believe the Hype

RipDelight This is a tender, generous movie that likes its characters and presents them as real people, full of flaws and strengths.

Bergorks If you like to be scared, if you like to laugh, and if you like to learn a thing or two at the movies, this absolutely cannot be missed.

Brucey D The film opens with an older Michael York setting the scene for the main events of the film which are seen in retrospective. His monologue begins;" Too many years have passed since that time; and now, my memory fools me. My thoughts become lost in a confused jumble....".And n'er a truer word were spake; I should have known....I recently recorded 'The Secret of the Sahara' when it was broadcast on UK TV channel 'movies4men', as a movie of about 2-02" actual running time. I was expecting something pretty good; after all with a decent cast, epic desert scenery, an intriguing plot, and a Morricone score, how could you go wrong?.Well, I think I know the answer to that now.First of all you make a mini-series which runs six hours. Because it is to be broadcast on TV in 1988, you shoot it in 4:3, (even though you are using Panavision cameras). To fill the time, you work the plot so that you have lots of characters who are peripheral to the main thrust of the story. You shoot and reshoot in the exact same setups, so that 'the empty desert' is nearly always full of footprints already. You have lots of people with strangely pale skin and have them play desert dwellers alongside folk who have the complexion of old shoe leather. You have your lead man, who has the plummiest British accent in recorded history, attempt to play an American.Then, you cut about four hours of what you have made, and attempt to cobble the rest of it into something that makes sense, all so that you can have 'a movie' with a vaguely normal running time.Well I can say that as a visual spectacle, the 4:3 format does it no favours, and whatever film-to-video transfer was done, the result is sub-VHS quality. That isn't so bad, there are plenty of films like that; it is just a wasted opportunity. However, unless you meant to do it from the start, and plan very carefully, you just can't cut four hours out of something and still have it make sense; as another reviewer has mentioned, characters appear and disappear for little reason, and even the main thrust of the plot is made obscure by all this.To my amusement, at one point Michael York 'pretends' to be an Engishman; 'ah-ha' I thought; 'this will be a plot twist where he will be revealed to have been English all along, and to have been pretending (badly) to be an American prior to this'.... No such luck....Later on, the David Soul character asks 'what is this place?'. I couldn't have told him, and (based on the events portrayed) I don't see how anyone else could have, either.I daresay that if you had seen and enjoyed the mini-series, the condensed movie version might well be like 'the greatest hits' to you. But if you haven't, it is very likely to seem like a load of garbled nonsense.If you have a special interest in any of the lead actors you are probably going to want to watch this, but otherwise, I think there are better things to see.

berberian00 Hi,I paid some 10 dollars for this DVD, with a duration of 360 min and a whole uncut production. However, this proved to be an Italian version of the movie with English subtitles.I don't pay tribute to such a hoax and want my money back!As for the argument of a friend of mine, that he is willing to make a recording from TV - viz., my answer is that it's worth making such an attempt in a high definition format and then transfer it to DVD in a proper studio. Further, collecting VHS tapes is old fashioned ...It so happened, that so many video information is blundered in so many incomprehensible languages. People are getting more distanced by this, instead of closing the gap ...

paul-carlier The Secret of the Sahara is the type of drama that Hollywood has long since abandoned. The story is original, the location (and sets) are breath taking and the cast is first class, with outstanding performances from Michael York as the obsessive archaeologist Desmond Jordan and Ben Kingsley as Sholomon, the Polish Jew who has found peace in the desert. David Soul provides a real sense of menace as Lieutenant Ryker and steals almost every scene from his co-stars. Andie MacDowell is slightly under used as are the other female cast members, but the director Alberto Negrin keeps the story moving along at a brisk pace, aided by a hauntingly beautiful musical score from Ennio Morricone. There are some obvious limitations to the production which are easily over looked; Ryker seems to cross the desert to the same two or three locations to dizzying effect, and some of the dialogue feels a bit out of place but these are only minor points. All in all this is a quality drama and I only wish that more of this calibre were made.

Tampopo There a many ways to make a dreadful film and Secret of the Sahara has found the secret to most of them. It is a badly plotted costume drama set in a strange Sahara populated by scores of magnificent horses, but only six camels; two very strange snakes - a fanged anaconda and a Southwest US sidewinder; a range of two dimensional characters played in some cases by talented actors; and a falcon in an oasis. Worst of all is the disjointed script. The characters do not so much interact as careen off each other. Characters disappear without further reference, characters ride off into the desert at exactly the point where they should have stayed at the oasis, and it is never clear what Jordan (Michael York) did learn. Every time a plot line establishes itself, a hole develops in it or the audience is left to wonder where it went. A great deal of talent (Kingsley, York, and McDowell) and a great deal of money is wasted in making this film. This is a film that leaves you singing the praises of the dolly grip.