The Three Investigators and the Secret of Skeleton Island (2007)

Director:

Florian Baxmeyer

Writers:

Robert Arthur (novel)
David Howard (screenplay)

Release Date:

2008 (USA)

Genre:

Adventure | Family | Mystery

Plot:

Plot Keywords:

Young Detectives | Amateur Detective | Based On Novel | Kids And Family

Cast

Chancellor Miller	...	Jupiter Jones
Nick Price	...	Pete Crenshaw
Cameron Monaghan	...	Bob Andrews
Naima Sebe	...	Chris
Nigel Whitmey	...	Al Crenshaw
James Faulkner	...	Bill
Fiona Ramsey	...	Miss Wilbur (as Fiona Ramsay)
Akin Omotoso	...	Gamba
Langley Kirkwood	...	Tom Farraday
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Andreas Fröhlich	...	Man at Junkyard
Oliver Rohrbeck	...	Man in Hotel

Also Known As:

Drei ??? - Das Geheimnis der Geisterinsel, Die (Germany) (promotional title)
Drei Fragezeichen und das Geheimnis der Geisterinsel, Die (Germany)

Runtime:

Germany:91 min (European Film Market)

Country:

Germany | South Africa

Language:

English

Colour:

Colour

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Certification:

Germany:6

Filming Locations:

Cape Town, South Africa

Company:

Studio Hamburg International Production (SHIP)

Movie Connections:

Referenced in "Wer wird Millionär?: Familienspecial #4" (2007)

Soundtrack:

Hide and Seek

Could have been worse, but clearly also could have been better

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

Just saw this one in a preview screening at the Hamburg Filmfest. As a long time fan of the early books and audio tapes which have been a great success here in Germany for decades, naturally I had certain expectations for this first movie version of a Three Investigators story. And by "certain" I mean, I already knew this was the first big international movie from Studio Hamburg (the production company) and so I could imagine the style to be quite a commercial as-mainstream-as-possible one. After all, it's a franchise product, isn't it? Well, I was not wrong.

To all the fans: Don't expect an authentic Three Investigators movie. Okay, there are some nods to the old school fan community, but they're sparse and don't really go with the flow, and then that's about it. It's a decent movie for children (although not really appropriate for the very young ones, some scenes may be too frightening), and it still can be interesting for the parents or of kind of an academic interest to the usual grown-up fan, but there are too much points where the protagonists just don't behave like the original characters would have. Also they don't really look that much as how the characters are described in the books. Bob doesn't even wear glasses, for whatever reason...

It's very obvious the movie is designed for this target audience notoriously called "kids". Not children, that is, but kids. It could have been worse of course, at least the boys don't wave mobile phones around, wear baggy pants and listen to hip hop via iPods (only once it starts to get too silly when they pull an itching powder blowgun with even a laser pointer mounted on top!). The makers fortunately chose to display a setting which is quite timeless in appearance. But then they try just too hard to please by putting in some die-hardish action scene, some james-bondish, some mission-impossiblish and some indiana-jonesish stuff and even - how misguided could they get - ROMANCE! While in the original story the three boys become friends with another boy, here this is changed to be a girl (a decision obviously led by marketing considerations). And the first comment one of the boys makes when they first see her, believe it or not, is something along the lines of "Wow, what a hot chick!" Though the boys are displayed as very young ones, as young as one could possibly imagine the characters from the most early books. When the original Three Investigators met girls, they dealt completely different with these encounters. They simply had no business with love interests back then, they were serious detectives only concerned to their mystery cases! It seems the writers of the screenplay had a merely superficial understanding about what made the Three Investigators special from the start - or they were pressed just too hard for prostitution.

By the way, the story has almost nothing to do with the original book episode of the same name. Besides the three main characters there are only two other persons which also appear in the original story (Peter's father and Faraday). The actual villain even turns out to be one from completely different episodes. While the elements which make up the case are typical for TTI stories mostly, it all comes around just too forced, too artificial. At least for the fans, I guess. For everyone else the movie might be a nice family fun ride (the children in the audience laughed at all the moments where it was intended), but then nothing particularly special. The only thing that would make this movie stick out, namely it being a TTI adaptation, of all things is what doesn't work that well. But on the other hand, to make this work well might be an impossible enterprise, considering how hard core the fan community has become over the many years and how diverse and inconsistent the TTI universe has become anyway.

We'll see how the producers will pull off the next installment, which they said is already underway...