Flickering Shadows - The Shadow!

I pulled out The Shadow movie from 1994 starring Alec Baldwin as the mysterious and gloomy hero and Penelope Ann Miller as a decidedly slinky Margot Lane. This is a pretty decent actioner with good Shadow gimmicks for the time. Love that Jim Steranko poster. 

The story is pretty good with Shiwan Khan showing up in a bravura performance by John Lone who chews up the scenery perfectly as the megalomaniacal uber-villain. His plan to hypnotize all of New York City while getting his mitts on a prototype of an "atomic bomb" is perfectly dastardly. His sidekicks, a bunch of dimwitted Mongols are pretty good too. Tim Curry as Khan's American-born henchman is definitely over the top, but for him it works. His inevitable demise is well earned. 

Alec Baldwin is a bit debonair for the role, but when they hit him with the makeup, he looks just like the Steranko covers I loved as a kid. Seeing the Shadow in action is highlight of this movie. He gets to do some dandy shooting, though I will confess he has a propensity for getting shot himself. The Shadow in this story is far from a superman, but a man with powers which overmatch regular thugs, but find their limits against a villain like Khan. 

I don't know how the origin story fits with the canon (not well I suspect) but giving the Shadow the need to atone for past crimes does give his focus a reason to exist. The sidekicks are great in this one. Penelope Ann Miller is ravishing as Margo Lane and stands up to Baldwin neatly in her scenes. Moe Shrevnitz is brought to the screen wonderfully by the much-missed Peter Boyle, a man who always had a devilish twinkle in his eye despite the role he played. And Ian McKellan gives a first-rate offering of a daft professor who just happens to be Margot's Dad.

There are some plot holes in this one you could drive a truck loaded with cliches through for sure, but some of the scenes are magnificent. When the Monolith Hotel is revealed in all its glory for the first time it is fantastic and gives a scope to the movie that elevates the whole affair for me. The movie owes a lot to the Keaton Batman flicks of the time, but those influences don't overwhelm the movie. I like this one a lot, and thoroughly enjoyed this time as well. 

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