Review: ‘Scorpion King’ wears crown of idiocy

Geoff Carter

Friday, April 19, 2002 | 9:18 a.m.

'Scorpion King'

Grade: **

Starring: The Rock, Steven Brand, Kelly Hu and Michael Clarke Duncan.

Screenplay: Stephen Sommers, David Hayter, William Osborne and Jonathan Hales.

Director: Chuck Russell.

Rated: PG-13 for intense sequences of action violence and some sensuality.

Running time: 94 minutes.

Movie times: http://www.vegas.com/movies/

Throughout "The Scorpion King," director Chuck Russell's prequel to Stephen Sommers' "The Mummy Returns" (itself a sequel: confound this new math), I thought of ascendant rocker Andrew W.K. His brand of rock 'n' roll is so stupid and gleefully anachronistic -- think Kiss mixed with The Cars -- that it borders on genius; you fall in love with it despite yourself.

"The Scorpion King" engenders no such feelings, but it tries. What the filmmakers have done is re-create a Steve Reeves "Hercules" picture, with all the trimmings -- idiot-savant sidekick, pretty half-dressed girl, flesh-eating ants, great armies of oiled body sculptors. It's not in Italian, and that's pretty much the only area in which "Scorpion" differs.

"The Scorpion King" appropriates these time-worn elements with the same measure of glee that Sommers must have felt when he raided Ray Harryhausen's oeuvre for "The Mummy Returns," and at times you enjoy the ride. Professional wrestler The Rock (real name Dwayne Johnson) is likeable and handsome, and in his fight scenes you can easily see where he could become the next Schwarzenegger.

The Rock might turn out to be a decent action actor -- it's a tougher genre to master than you think -- but that hardly matters to "The Scorpion King." It's as ostentatious a display of pure idiocy as you're likely to see this year. Similar to Andrew W.K., it throws down everything it's got. The battle scenes are violent but bloodless (similar to "The Mummy," sound effects do most of the work), the comedy is broad, and most of the characters are so stereotypical as not to even have names.

Chief among these nameless entities is The Woman (Kelly Hu) and The Comic Relief (Grant Heslov). There's also The Weird Old Man (Bernard Hill), The Rival Warrior (Michael Clarke Duncan) and The Villain (Steven Brand), who actually has a name: Memnon, which is this close to being "No Name" backwards.

None of them matter. What does matter is The Rock's prowess with sword and bow, his ability to cut down opponents with the sound of a knife stabbing a kasaba melon, and "The Scorpion King's" Egyptian setting, "before the time of the pyramids" -- a background that's ready-made for appropriating pieces from other desert action movies. I caught references to "Lawrence of Arabia," "Spartacus" and even "Monty Python's Life of Brian" with one eye open; you'll probably find more.

"The Scorpion King" boasts several writers, one of which is Jonathan Hales. He penned the script to "Attack of the Clones," the second episode of the "Star Wars" saga, due out in a few weeks. Believe it or not, his involvement here bodes well -- it shows that George Lucas was looking for a writer with crowd-pleasing appeal.

As mediocre as "The Scorpion King" is, it knows that it's not about building myths; it's all about rock and roll. Nobody goes to summer movies to see Joseph Campbell; they go to see the visual equivalent of Andrew W.K., tearing up the seats with a smile on his face. The Rock should pair with W.K. next time out, and do some real damage.