Director/Screenplay/Photography – Matt Snead, Producers – Rrivre Davies, James Freeburn, Rebecca Freeburn, Ed Gillow, Tom Gurnee, Darren Kendrick, Andrea Loewendorf, Rrivre Works & Matt Snead, Music – Massimo Sammi, Visual Effects – James Kummerfeldt, Production Design – Andrea Loewendorf. Production Company – Standard Issue Co./Rrivre Works Studios.
Cast
Tom Gurnee (Marcus O’Riley), Darren Kendrick (Charles ‘The Magician’ Davenport), Vianney Tepper (Agent Rodriguez), James Bentley (The Count), William Tulin (Burt McBaldly), Jilon VanOver (Director Maxwell Tavington), Alan Gray (The Professor), Patrick Elwood Kaiser (Hans the Butler), Judy Fisher (Stolen Necklace Woman)
Plot
Chicago, 1893. Marcus O’Riley, an adventurer who seeks mythological artefacts, is arrested while going to retrieve his adventuring companion Charles ‘The Magician’ Davenport from a brothel. With both facing charges of immorality, the government offers to commute their arrest if they will undertake a mission. They are required to go on a quest to find an item originally discovered by the Brothers Grimm – a magical gun that fires a never-ending supply of bullets. Outfitted with steam guns, they set forth, joined along the way by Rodriguez, an agent of the Mexican government, as they race against the villainous The Count to find the compass that leads the way to the gun.
Gentlemen Explorers intrigued me by calling itself “the first live action Steampunk film”. Steampunk, which has become an alternate culture in recent years, was originally a form of alternate history science-fiction based on imagining speculated developments of Victorian technology. There have been assorted Steampunk works on film – I have an essay on the subject here at Steampunk Films – where I cite several other works that could also lay claim to being the first live-action Steampunk films.
Gentlemen Explorers – known as Young Gentlemen Explorers on the credits of the version I found on YouTube – was the third film from Matt Snead, Snead had previously made the action film Kingbreaker (2010) and the SF film Reckless (2011).
When you sit down to watch the film, the actual Steampunk element proves somewhat disappointing. It is Steampunk in the sense that the film readily taps into the culture that has grown up around the fad with people outfitted in pseudo-Victorian gear. On the other hand, the film is less Steampunk in the sense of featuring technological advances based on Victorian designs – the two adventurers are outfitted with steam-powered pistols and that is it. The rest falls more into being a 19th Century Adventure Film about questors for a Magical Artefact, which places it more into the arena of something like a Western era version of tv’s The Librarians (2014-6).
Gentleman explorers – (l to r) Marcus O’Riley (Tom Gurnee) and Charles ‘The Magician’ Davenport (Darren Kendrick)
Gentleman Explorers comes with a great deal of conceptual ambition. This is unfortunately undercut by the film being made on a low-budget with not entirely adequate resources. The film is reliant on digital backlot technology (where actors are shot against greenscreens and backgrounds inserted later). Unfortunately from the opening shots of a steam paddler in Alaska, the shabby opticals and background insertions let the entire show down. On the plus side, the film is bolstered by the panoramic shooting of actual steam trains and rail bridges in several scenes.
The film is also beset by one of the big fall downs of the amateur filmmaking – bad acting – and frequently in really fake British accents. The worst offender here is Snead regular Darren Kendrick, who also produces the film, a beanpole figure who gives an annoying performance in a gratingly fake falsetto with lots of hand movements. Several of the other actors – James Bentley, Patrick Elwood Kaiser – also take the opportunity to go over-the-top, while Vianney Tepper, who plays the Mexican agent, has an annoying habit of stating everything in fierce demanding tones with no variation.
That said, the film has clear ambition. I wish there had been something more epical in the adventure department – things are notedly lacking in action scenes, apart from the occasional shootout. There is the odd amusing moment, like where Tom Gurnee ends up in a gambling game only to find what is at stakes in his losing is the entire territory of the Southwestern USA. The end credits promise a sequel, which has yet to emerge.
