My Name Is Modesty: A Modesty Blaise Adventure (2004
An origin story based on the early years of the character Modesty Blaise, a former crime boss turned secret agent. Told as flashback when the casino she is head croupier at is overrun by Nikolaj Coster-Waldau's gang of machine gun wielding thugs we see how a resourceful little girl from the Balkan wars met up with a man who would become her mentor and teach her everything from languages to martial arts.
Even at a mere 75 minutes this feels overlong. Other than a final action scene which is decent enough the rest of the film is all back story. It felt like i was watching a pilot episode of a series that was never commissioned rather than a fully fledged feature film in it's own right. Thankfully Alexandra Staden is assured as Modesty and her verbal battle with Coster-Waldau manages to keep things ticking over before the big fight finale.
The dvd however is something else. There are lengthy synopsis of all 95 of author Peter O'Donnell's books and stories as well as many examples of featured artwork. There's an hour interview with the author, plus a 42 minute chat with fanboy and executive producer Quentin Tarantino, a 15 minute making of and a couple of commentaries including director Scott Spiegel & producer Ted Nicolaou. Basically it's everything a fan of Modesty Blaise could want and is so much more worthwhile than any of the dvd / Blu-ray releases of the 1966 film Modesty Blaise.
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