My Thoughts on the Film, Romancing the Stone...

In true Hollywood fashion, Raiders of the Lost Ark spawned many copycats. Or at least, they had several films that wanted to be ROTLA. Some were hits, some were misses.

Romancing the Stone fell somewhere in the middle. It was a hit when it was released—both critically and commercially—and helped to launch the career of director Robert Zemeckis. Unfortunately, it also had many of the drawbacks of an 1980s film.

One of these drawbacks was a sparse script, sacrificing character development for plot. Indeed, many of the characters, especially Ralph, played by Danny DeVito, and Zolo, portrayed by Manuel Ojeda, appeared two-dimensional, cartoonish, cardboard cutout-like villains.

This was neither the actors' nor the director’s fault. It was, as said above, a sign of the times. But it made me think of Raiders of the Lost Ark, and how that film was timeless, while this one seemed dated. If I performed a side-by-side comparison of each script, I’m sure I’d come across similarities, and perhaps I’d do so and write about it in a future blog post.

Kathleen Turner and Michael Douglas fared well as the two leads, containing the requisite chemistry such characters should have in any romance, and made the film wholly watchable. But their portrayals also fell victim to a clipped, 1980s script.

I’d recommend this film to lovers of action and adventure, and romance films.