carbuff Solid but uninspired movie which could have been profitably edited down by around 45 minutes. I can't remember the original plot too well anymore, but I believe that this production does seem to reflect some modern liberal political sensibilities, which likely weren't there originally--in and of itself, this is a legitimately different twist to put on things, except that it throws a few forced clunkers into the script. The performances by Izzard as a subdued Silver and Wood as Jim are pretty strong, but, Sutherland, as with all of his later movies, is just cashing a paycheck and does not at all seem invested in, or appropriate to, the role. Also, as a long-time small boat sailor, it kind of drove me nuts that they never raised more sail than they did--my guess is that this is not historically accurate, but instead reflected the limited budget of the movie, meaning that they didn't want to shell out for the cost of additional sails for the ship. If the movie was going to be dragged out to three hours, I personally wanted a lot more exciting sailing action. The production values are not quite up to that of a theater quality film, but compare favorably to those of a top-notch TV production. A perfect movie to watch with children if one wants to avoid sex and extreme violence, but for a modern adult audience, as long as liberties were going to be taken, it could maybe have been a bit grittier. Still, I can't say that I feel that I have wasted three hours or anything like that, and I'm not really significantly disappointed in any way at all, except for the dearth of sailing action.

David Holt (rawiri42) This yet-another cinematic version of Treasure Island is a typically well-made and remarkably accurate British portrayal of Robert Louis Stevenson's classic masterpiece swashbuckling 1891 novel. It is not over-dramatised whilst also not "over-softening" the violent and bloody scenes.As a TV miniseries, the run time of three hours when viewed all at once on DVD isn't too much either. I found it well worth the time spent and, whilst knowing what to expect having read the book, no less enjoyable. I did notice a couple of continuity errors that I thought unusual for such a well-made movie - in particular, the number of men in Long John Silvers' party before and after several were killed in their siege of the stockade but I suppose it didn't make it any less enjoyable.For what it's worth, I couldn't help visualising Jason Statham in the role of of Long John Silver (not that Eddie Izzard didn't do a great job - it was just that I kept seeing him in his more typical comedic role) and Sam Neill as Captain Smollett. Donald Sutherland was brilliant as Captain Flint and Elijah Woods a bit quirky as Ben Gunn and nothing like I'd previously imagined the character from the book. Another big surprise was Billy Bones being a negro but certainly not out of character.I also thought that Tony Regbo, an actor I had never heard of prior to this movie did a very competent job as Jim Hawking - arguably the star of the novel. It will be interesting to see what this leads to for him.All in all, a jolly good British evening's entertainment.

sri-25 Treasure Island is one of my absolute favorite books, and so I tend to shy away from movies of it; they never do the book justice. This feature is no exception- and yet it is one.The deliciously adult depictions of the pirates, the times, and the addition of the storyline about Mrs. Hawkins and Mrs. Silver work beautifully to add twist and interest to what might be an over-familiar tale. I thought Izzard was a brilliant Long John Silver. I also felt Wood's Ben Gunn was wonderfully true to the spirit of the character, and the twist to his tale (away from the original book storyline) at the end also was thoughtful and interesting, and more just to the character.On the other hand, the serious destruction of the characters of the Squire and the Doctor utterly destroy the main contrasts and points of the original story: the pitting of honesty, generosity, courage, and loyalty in believable, likable characters against the evils of self-indulgence, trickery, greed, and cowardice of the pirates. It also takes away from Jim Hawkins coming-of-age by handing that role- strangely- to the Doctor.I also thought it utterly idiotic to dump the treasure at the end. It is almost like somebody decided they wanted to have the treasure dumped in an allegory against greed, and so they fit the "good guys" to this ideal, making them into bad guys, just like the pirates. Or, perhaps they wanted you to cheer harder for Long John Silver and be happier about him getting away in the end (I'm all good with Jim helping him to escape, especially with the insertion of the woman-at-home storyline to compliment it), so they had to make the "good" guys into cowardly jerks so you wouldn't want them to win- which is, of course, superficial and stupid.In the end, it is a beautiful rendition, if you can get over the annoying changes to the Squire and the Doctor- or just take them as given as they are, and watch it for the wonderful complexity of Long John Silver and Jim Hawkins and their shifting and changing relationship.

celr I wanted to like this recreation of the classic Treasure Island. One doesn't expect a slavish adherence to the original as long as the main story elements are in place, and who would be nitpicking enough to criticize every deviation from precise details of 18th century settings, customs and props. Making the feckless first mate a black guy might be a stretch, Billy Bones is not black in the original, but even the book describes Long John's wife as "a woman of color." Political correctness would be certain to ruin any classic, but I didn't detect toxic amounts of that here. No, the violation was far worse. About one third of the way through this re-creation takes a dark and nasty turn.So I was enjoying this Treasure Island and it's dodgy crew as they set out to sea. Only having had it read to me as a small lad, but I kept coming up short: "Wait a minute! I don't remember that!" I knew my memory of the book was quite faded so I had to look it up. In this TV production squire Trelawney is turned into an angry, abusive tyrant. He virtually keelhauls some poor fellow as a punishment and the fellow dies as Jim looks on. That is totally gratuitous, it's not in the book. In fact, Trelawney is supposed to be a decent fellow and invites Jim on the voyage because he likes him. Later in the TV version the Squire abuses Jim irrationally and cruelly and drives him out of the camp on the island. He is supposed to be Jim's protector, but in this version he becomes his persecutor. Classics are classics for a reason. In the story of Treasure Island it's the power of the narrative, the storytelling, that's the key to its popularity for many generations. The makers of this TV drama, as in so much of movies and TV drama, have no sense of the narrative. Treasure Island is a story of a rite of passage, of a young man being introduced to the world and for this to work he needs people on his side, protectors who care about his welfare. For him to be betrayed by the people who brought him along and took him into their confidence, makes no sense at all. At that point the narrative loses its moral compass and becomes absurd. I can't imagine a motive for such a drastic alteration in the story. Certainly Trelawney is given no motive to turn on Jim and leave him to the mercy of a bunch of cutthroats who intend to kill him. At that point in the TV version Jim is on his own, he virtually has to take care of himself. He has no allies. But rite of passage is not something that adolescents do on their own, as in "Lord of the Flies." They need compassionate adults to help them along. And though I can't imagine why the screenwriters made such a poor decision about the plot line, I can see the parallels with contemporary culture where many young people are virtually abandoned by their elders and left to raise themselves on junk food and pop culture. Along with that comes a visceral dislike of established values, the well-off, and any authority, combined with an exaggerated feeling of entitlement. Perhaps the writers thought that the values of the RLS book were too outdated and corny for an audience of feral children used to getting their own way. As in the "Occupy" movement, all rich guys are automatically considered evil just because they're rich, so the squire has to be evil. I don't know. But you can see the result of such a philosophy in the London riots of 2011 and the ever expanding percentage of out-of-wedlock births in the Western world. In any case these seemingly unnecessary alterations in the story line throw the entire story out of kilter, and Treasure Island is no longer fun. Don't get me started on the ridiculous ending. Avoid this version.