Photo du haut William.H.Macy

Résumé Wiki

Pour Dirk Pitt, explorateur, scientifique et aventurier, découvrir cette pièce de légende n'était que le premier pas vers l'aventure la plus risquée de sa vie et une incroyable légende historique...Avec son inséparable partenaire et ami, Al Giordino, Dirk se lance dans une chasse au trésor qui va les conduire dans les régions les plus reculées d'Afrique, sur les traces d'un navire mystérieusement disparu avec sa cargaison secrète.

Ils vont rencontrer le Dr. Eva Rojas, une femme médecin persuadée que le trésor caché a un lien avec une menace redoutable pour le monde...Face aux obstacles, aux mystères et aux pièges, Dirk, Al et Eva ne pourront compter que sur eux-mêmes. Ce n'est pas à une énigme qu'ils s'attaquent mais à deux, et chacune peut leur coûter la vie...

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Sahara is worth a look

Author: DCJerzeygrl from United States
24 February 2005

By accident, I caught an advance screening of this movie last night in DC. I'd heard negative reviews, but thankfully did not let that cloud my judgment. The chemistry between Matthew McConaughey & Steve Zahn is palpable. I didn't think the chemistry between Penelope & Matthew sizzled, till the end. But since we all know now that they're together...I find it amusing. Good for them!! The location shots for this movie are phenomenal, esp Morocco.

*I'm bringing ALL my Moroccan friends to the movie when it is released. It's similar to National Treasure, but not as slick. There was more sarcastic humor throughout National Treasure, but there's great buddy chemistry in Sahara. I HOPE that Steve Zahn & Matthew McConaughey do a sequel or at least another movie together. This film is worth the price of full admission.

Steve Zahn (l'homme à la mitraillette)

Cast
Matthew McConaughey : Dirk Pitt
Steve Zahn : Al Giordino
Penélope Cruz  : Eva Rojas
Lambert Wilson  : Yves Massarde
Lennie James  : le général Kazim
Dayna Cussler : Kitty Mannock
Clint Dyer  : Oshodi
Delroy Lindo  : l'agent Carl
William H. Macy  : l'amiral James Sandecker
Patrick Malahide  : l'ambassadeur Polidori
Nathan Osgood : le lieutenant Gun
Billy Seymour : Powder Monkey
Rainn Wilson : Rudi Gunn
Mark Wells : un marin
Daniel Lobé : Touareg Sangare

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 La critique de Roger Ebert -April 7, 2005 

Clive Cussler, who wrote the novel that inspired "Sahara," is said to have rejected untold drafts of the screenplay and sued Paramount over this one. One wonders not so much what Cussler would have left out as what else could have gone in. "Sahara" obviously contains everything that could possibly be included in such a screenplay, and more. It's like a fire sale at the action movie discount outlet.

Do not assume I mean to be negative. I treasure the movie's preposterous plot. It's so completely over the top, it can see reality only in its rear-view mirror. What can you say about a movie based on the premise that a Confederate ironclad ship from the Civil War is buried beneath the sands of the Sahara, having ventured there 150 years ago when the region was, obviously, damper than it is now?

Matthew McConaughey plays Dirk Pitt, the movie's hero, who is searching for the legendary ship. Dirk Pitt. Now that is a name. Dirk Pitt. Or Pitt, Dirk. Makes Brad Pitt sound like William Pitt. Dirk has a thing about long-lost ships; readers may recall that he was also the hero of "Raise the Titanic" (1980), a movie so expensive that its producer, Lord Lew Grade, observed, "It would have been cheaper to lower the ocean."

Dirk has a sidekick named Al Giordino, played by Steve Zahn in the time-honored Movie Sidekick mode. Was it Walter Huston who explained that movie heroes need sidekicks "because somebody has to do the dance." You know, the dance where the sidekick throws his hat down on the ground and stomps on it in joy or anger? You can't have your hero losing his cool like that.

The two men arrive in Africa to find that a dangerous plague is spreading. The plague is being battled by the beautiful Dr. Eva Rojas (Penelope Cruz), and it turns out that Dirk and Eva share mutual interests, since if the plague spreads down rivers and "interacts with salt water," there is a danger that "all ocean life will be destroyed." Actually, I am not sure why that is only a mutual interest; it's more of a universal interest, you would think, although General Kazim (Lennie James), the African dictator, and an evil French zillionaire (Lambert Wilson) don't seem much disturbed. That's because they're getting rich in a way I will not reveal, although there is something grimly amusing about converting pollutants into other pollutants.

The movie directed by Breck Eisner, son of Michael, is essentially a laundry line for absurd but entertaining action sequences. Dirk, Eva and Al have an amazing series of close calls in the desert, while Admiral Sandecker (ret.) (William H. Macy) keeps in touch with them by radio and remains steadfast in his course, whatever it is. There are chases involving planes, trains, automobiles, helicopters, dune buggies, wind-propelled airplane carcasses, and camels. The heroes somewhat improbably conceal themselves inside a tank car on a train going toward a secret desert plant (improbably, since the car going in that direction should have been full), and then find themselves one of those James Bondian vantage points inside the plant, from where they can observe uniformed clones carrying out obscure tasks.

There is a race against time before everything explodes, of course, and some bizarre science involving directing the sun's rays, and then what do you suppose turns up? If you slapped yourself up alongside the head and shouted out, "The long-lost Civil War ironclad?," you could not be more correct. Gee, I wonder if its cannons will still fire after this length of time?

I enjoyed this movie on its own dumb level, which must mean (I am forced to conclude) in my own dumb way. I perceive that I have supplied mostly a description of what happens in the film, filtered through my own skewed amusement. Does that make this a real review?

Funny you should ask. As it happens, I happened to be glancing at Gore Vidal's article about the critic Edmund Wilson in a 1993 issue of the New York Review of Books. There Vidal writes: "Great critics do not explicate a text; they describe it and then report on what they have described, if the description itself is not the criticism." In this case, I think the description itself is the criticism. Yes, I'm almost sure of it.

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Story altered but great flick

I was not disappointed. The film makers did rearrange the story a bit (treasure hunters instead of the research scientists), Sandecker retired (not in his usual office at NUMA). They omitted a few details from the book (such as Lincoln being on the Texas and Kitty Mancock the pilot of the plane, and of course the scene in the book where the author himself appears) but overall I just LOVED this movie. It was packed with action and the chemistry between Dirk/Al was fantastic. I feel that all the actors played their respective parts great and it is my sincere hope that we will get to see these characters again.

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Autour du film

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