Kevin Costner | Wanderings and ... wonderings.

Jul 20 2026

Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves (1991).

How to describe Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves (1991) to someone yet to have ‘the experience’ – it’s nuts.

Kevin Costner is in it with a receding hairline/mullet combo. He leads a gang of Midlands-based Bolsheviks with American accents who spend their time chilling in Sherwood Forest and robbing successful people of their hard-earned cash – it’s an unintentional allegory.

Morgan Freeman is also in it, and he seems to have adopted an accent that’s straight outta Cool Runnings (1994). The best bit of the yarn is when they get from Dover to Nottingham, Alan Rickman’s domain, via Hadrian’s Wall.

It’s an insane movie and looks like it was made merely to test whether an insane movie could be a success.

Tagged Cinema, Film, Kevin Costner, Movie, Prince of Thieves, Robin Hood

Dec 11 2024

Bull Durham (1988).

A movie ostensibly about baseball. I know nothing about baseball aside from the name Babe Ruth. This movie almost piqued my interest in the sport of baseball.

From a time when Kevin Costner could do no wrong, hit after hit.

This movie is good and if made today it would most likely have to have a ‘message’ or token member of a downtrodden minority. Or a lesbian.

Something like that.

Tagged Baseball, Bull Durham, Cinema, Film, Images, Kevin Costner, Movie, Sport, Tim Robbins

Aug 23 2019

Waterworld (1995) – Mad Max on water.

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A notorious ‘flop’ that actually turned a small profit, Waterworld (1995) is at equal turns demented, awful, and glorious. A lot of the smug and snooty assassination of it clearly came from critics of the era who decided the omniscient Kevin Costner was getting too big for his boots. The movie is indeed patronising and way too overblown, character decisions perplexing, the dialogue stilted, and Costner appears to be sleepwalking through much of it and at full performance attempting a Clint Eastwood ‘Man with No Name’ number. And it can’t hold a candle to any of the Mad Max movies.

However, the stunts and action set pieces are nothing if not spectacular, and it’s one of the few ecologically themed movies out there, something with a vision that at least attempts to make a point. There are also so many peculiar moments amidst the explosions: Kevin Costner drinking his own piss, Kevin Costner’s gills and webbed feet, Dennis Hopper – who appears to have wandered off the set of Speed (1994) – away with the fairies, and the interlude with the loco Irish (or he is Scottish? Or a mixture of the two?) would-be rapist who has a talent for hoarding paper. It’s an experience.

Nothing’s free in Waterworld.

Wanderings and … wonderings.

Tag Archives: Kevin Costner

Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves (1991).

Bull Durham (1988).

Waterworld (1995) – Mad Max on water.