The Jewel of the Nile (1985)
The Jewel of the Nile is a sequel to the successful romantic adventure comedy of the year prior, Robert Zemeckis’ Romancing the Stone, featuring the same main players in Michael Douglas, Kathleen Turner, and Danny DeVito, but without the return of Zemeckis or screenwriter Diane Thomas to guide it. After Zemeckis had been unceremoniously and unnecessarily fired by the studio from his gig directing Cocoon because they thought Romancing the Stone would tank, they had little chance of getting him on board again, so in as director is Roger Corman protege Lewis Teague, known more for his chillers, including directing Alligator and two adaptations of Stephen King works, Cujo and Cat’s Eye, the latter of which Teague was still working on as he took on The Jewel of the Nile. The screenwriting team of Mark Rosenthal and Lawrence Konner, whose only previous production would come earlier that year in The Legend of Billie Jean, would be hired on to script this new adventure. Overall, it’s a more lavish production, more of an attempt to elevate the series into an epic, putting spectacle and explosions to the forefront, relying on silly stereotypes to pass in place of characterizations.
As far as the plot line, it’s hard to live up to a “happily ever after ending”, especially for a successful romance novelist like Joan Wilder, who has learned more about romance in the chase than she does in the union of the two would-be lovebirds. It’s affecting her work, as she struggles to come up with new dreams and situations to fuel her romance novels, resulting in a prolonged bout of writer’s block. As Joan and her hunky man of adventure, Jack Colton, have spent their time living the life of luxury partying in Cannes and sailing on their yacht off the French Riviera, boredom begins to set in, realizing the excitement in their lives lie more in reminiscing, causing them to wonder if their good run of romance has run out as they near the expectation of their marriage in Greece.
When a well-known leader within the fictional North African country of Kadir, a supremely wealthy sheikh named Omar, approaches her to write his life’s story, on the hope of elevating his status among his people to become the new emperor there, Joan sees new possibilities to change her scenery, her outlook, and her horizons as a writer. Jack and Joan reluctantly split up, but when Jack catches wind that Omar may be in possession of the mysteriously alluring “Jewel of the Nile”, his soldier-of-fortune ways get the better of him, so he decides to get a closer look in Kadir, as does the diminutive lowlife named Ralph, who insists that Jack owes him enough for them to help each other get the jewel and split their fortune. Meanwhile, Joan discovers that Omar’s dark side and his attempt at a bloody power grab, leading her to try to get the scoop, as well as help spring a valuable prisoner who is seen as a folk hero to the people of the region, and therefore, Omar’s greatest threat to be respected as leader.
Michael Douglas returns as producer, though he was rumored to think it wasn’t the best idea. Nevertheless, the original contract for Romancing the Stone had the main cast sign on for a sequel, should 20th Century Fox choose to make one, and given that it was their biggest hit in an era that was no longer producing Star Wars films, they decided to play the hottest hand they had at the time. Douglas reluctantly decided to make a quick follow-up, getting behind the film as producer, and trying to make the best of the situation from a money standpoint. This time, the makers end up embracing its comparisons to the Indiana Jones adventures rather than just shrug it off as a coincidence, as they had with the first entry, throwing in a little of the James Bond vibe that had been so prevalent in action films of the 1980s.
Like Douglas, Kathleen Turner also wasn’t keen on returning for the sequel, insisting she was still owed money for the first film, and because she didn’t much care for the script for the second part, calling it terrible and formulaic, and she didn’t understand why the original screenwriter of the first film wasn’t even asked to provide a screenplay for the follow-up (Diane Thomas was asked, but reportedly wanted more money than Douglas was willing to shell out, as she was already busy working with Spielberg on the script to what would eventually be released in 1989 as Always). Her hold-out prompted the studio, 20th Century Fox, to file a lawsuit against her for $25 million, and the threat of keeping her from appearing in any other movies. Turner and Fox eventually came to an agreement, which included multiple re-writes to iron out some of the things that Turner found objectionable.
Everyone agreed that the original Rosenthal and Konner script was not what they wanted, so TV comedy talents Ken Levine and David Isaacs were called in and made un-credited contributions, especially to the French Riviera opening act of the film that ties it to the first entry directly, with Diane Thomas also chipping in with some ideas for a couple of days to try to make it work (for her effort, Douglas bought her a Porsche, which, sadly, would be the vehicle in which she, as a passenger, would lose her life in a terrible car accident weeks later). Douglas was pleased, but Turner still didn’t like it, so she hammered out changes with Douglas until they came to a compromise. It would be wise for the film’s success, as her chemistry with Douglas is the best part of their collaborations together. However, Levine and Isaacs were unavailable to continue to work on location to help continue to work with the script, so Douglas brought back Rosenthal and Konner on board, who reportedly ditched many of the newer and better ideas and put in their original ones.
The characterizations stretch things a bit, with Joan Wilder shown more as an international celebrity for her best-selling novels, rather than just the modestly successful scribe of trashy romances that we witnessed in our prior outing. The story stretches things even further by turning the character into a would-be biographer, and then a serious investigative journalist, in order to justify the need for her to lurk around and find out as much unsavory information as she can about her initially benevolent Omar that will reveal he is a true wolf in sheep’s clothing after all is said and done. Perhaps the more disappointing aspect of the changes made to her character is how little she and Jack seem to value their relationship, willing to part ways in the course of a short disagreement, with the makers of the film thinking that it’s more interesting to see the would-be lovers fight to be with each other again in a formula fashion. However, their reasons for their break-up makes them both look shallow and self-serving, and all too quick to throw away what they’ve built up, that it devalues the relationship as something that would likely only be temporary, and our interest in seeing a “happily ever after” for the couple is muted significantly.
Danny DeVito is shoe-horned in with an exceedingly contrived angle that has him following Jack across the world to get what he feels he is owed, and becoming a barnacle to the adventure once he learns of the valuable jewel. Ostensibly, DeVito is here for comic relief, and while the actor is up for the role, the repartee between Douglas and Turner while they are in peril is still the best part of the film, and another comic sidekick role is given to a kooky local wise man the duo encounter that they must secure to safety, relegating the Ralph character as a needless distraction this time out.
Greek actor Spyros Fokas plays the main heavy of the film, Omar Khalifa, modeled to be a mix of several dictators in the region, including Muammar Gaddafi and Saddam Hussein. His voice is rumored to have been dubbed after preview audiences said they had a difficult time understanding him through his accent. Ethnic stereotypes abound, as our heroes not only have to deal with a whole host of unsavory depictions of Muslims and Arabs, painted as either evil infidels or comical mystics, but also encounter an antiquated version of an African tribe, and does so with seemingly no qualms, as many Hollywood films of this period tended to do.
As with the first film, the adventure is peppered with humor, much of which is whimsical without pulling out any knee-slappers. The best scene of the film is also one of the silliest, in which Jack and Joan are dangling over a deep chasm, tied up with ropes that are being gnawed on by rats down below. The scene draws out that romantic chemistry, as the two, facing seemingly certain death, express their love for one another, in ways that bring back some of that magic that had eroded by their superficial break-up. The perilous situation not just the most romantic, but the funniest, as Jack expresses disgust, questioning what kind of sick, psychopathic mind would come up with such a way to kill someone, to which Joan reveals that the bad guys stole the idea from her best-selling book.
Shot in parts of France and Morocco, with the latter locales being particularly challenging to slog through to the finish. As with Romancing the Stone, The Jewel of the Nile was plagued with heavy rains in what normally was arid country, this time wreaking havoc on the sets that were constructed for the purpose of the movie, and when the rains subsided, high temperature, ranging over 120 degrees, made it a difficult and tension-filled time for all involved. Further complications arose from some of the props for the film being held back while going through customs in Morocco (prompting the producers to have to bribe officials to get their needed equipment in the country), as well as the observance of Ramadan, a period of fasting for many, affecting their ability to maintain morale among the many hungry extras they were utilizing for key scenes. The cast and crew would grow frustrated with director Teague for not having enough know-how to navigate a high-budget action flick, including one debacle where hours were spent setting up an elaborate scene only to discover the cameras did not have any film to capture the scene.
Further tragedies occurred with the death of art director Richard Dawking and location manager Bryan Coates, who died in Morocco in an airplane piloted by Richard Kotch while scouting locales. The film is dedicated to them, as well as to Romancing the Stone screenwriter, and creator of the main characters, Diane Thomas, who died in a car accident weeks before the release of the sequel. Dawking’s widow would end up suing Fox and the producers (including Douglas) for the sum of $3 million for his wrongful death.
One thing learned from the first entry is that a soundtrack can be useful in marketing the film. Eddy Grant’s “Romancing the Stone” was made for the first entry, but was not put into the film except part of the instrumental in the background of one scene, and was not put onto the official soundtrack, causing Grant to release it on his own, to Top 40 success. This time out, the studio commissioned Jive records to put in songs, contriving of ways to get them into the movie, including having the rebel faction, known as the Sufis, carrying a boom-box wherever they go, always playing a new Jive/Arista Records artist. Billy Ocean’s “When the Going Gets Tough, The Tough Get Going” not only fits in with one of the motifs of the film’s dialogue, but the trio of Douglas, DeVito and Turner also appeared in the music video as background singers. The single would zoom up the pop charts internationally, peaking at #2 in the US (denied the top spot by the Whitney Houston smash, “How Will I Know?”), and hitting #1 in the UK, Australia and Canada.
With a reported budget of over $20 million (more than twice that of its predecessor), more money would go to a few elaborate action set-pieces, including an overly lengthy chase sequence with the protagonists in the cockpit of an F-16 fighter plane, and a lavish, Nuremberg-esque political rally toward the end of the film with over a thousand extras in from of an elaborately built (and impressively destroyed) platform to extol the spiritual greatness of Omar to his people. The further investment would prove to be worth the cost, as it would become a success at the box office, besting its predecessors take by scoring over $95 million worldwide, landing as the number seven film of 1985 in the United States in terms of box office performance, even though, like its predecessor, it would never secure the top spot for any week of its release, mostly thanks to the rabid success of Rocky IV. It would greatly benefit from a very generous PG rating, despite PG-13’s existence since the summer of 1984, despite quite a bit of violence, some nudity (though, to be fair, it is natural nudity from the Nubian tribe) and some spicy language which would have easily earned it a PG-13 by later, more fine-tuned standards.
Despite its success, the series would end here, though there were initial talks to bring everyone back for a third go-round in the 1990s, dubbed “The Crimson Eagle”, which was reported to involve a heist in their adventures in Thailand, with Jack and Joan now having kids. Douglas scrapped that, but ten years later, he flirted with a new project, now called “Racing the Monsoon’, but never got very far. A remake of Romancing the Stone had been put into development in 2007, but eventually a theatrical effort was scrapped in favor of a TV show. Even if another entry did not happen, the popular trio of actors would be reunited again for the unrelated The War of the Roses, in which Douglas and Turner explore the darkest side of marriage ever put to film, and DeVito taking the helm as the director.
Qwipster’s rating: C+
MPAA Rated: PG for violence, language, sensuality, and some nudity
Running time: 106 min.
Cast: Michael Douglas, Kathleen Turner, Danny DeVito, Spyros Fokas, Avner Eisenberg, Paul David Magid, Holland Taylor
Director: Lewis Teague
Screenplay: Mark Rosenthal, Lawrence Konner