“What’s in a name?”.. Sinbad Globalized

By Karma Sami, SEE

Cairo, Sep 1- His name evoked dreams of high-sea liberation which inspired generations after generations. Sinbad the Sailor of Baghdad is no longer the more-than-one-thousand-old hero from Arabian Nights. His stories have been told and retold. His has brightened the silver screen for decades with his adventures though blown out of proportion and culturally inaccurate.

Thanks to the magic of the visual effects guru Ray Harryhausen (1920-2013), Sinbad made it to the world popularity which he earned in The Seventh Voyage of Sinbad (1958), The Golden Voyage of Sinbad (1973) and Sinbad and the Eye of the Tiger (1977). Harryhausen created a cinematic world populated by a Cyclops, a dragon, a shrinking princess, a baboon prince, wrecked buildings, a homunculus, giant animated snakes, a griffin and a one-eyed centaur, the Trog and the sabertooth among a multitude of beasts and freaks. The stories were decadent remnants of the original. However, the Harryhausen visual treats made history for their contemporary movie-goers and later family entertainment popcorn and pizza nights.

The last cinematic blow, however, is the most painful and demeaning. "Sinbad: Legend of the Seven Seas" (2003) kisses the age of innocence good-bye. The movie is an animated adventure comedy that swaggers to the extreme of cinematic storytelling. Believe it or not, Sinbad is neither an Arab nor a sailor/merchant. He is a pirate/thief from Syracuse. Take the myth from Sinbad, the man, and an alleged criminal record appears. You may also call him a terrorist now that his goal is to steal the magical Book of Peace to the highest bidder. Gone is the epic proportion that generations dreamed of and wished to emulate, though the movie is written by John Logan, an academy-award winner (Gladiator) who knows the landmine terrain of writing stories of different cultures.

The children who grew up on Harryhausen’s artistic imagination have let him down in their pursuit of a story befitting the so-called norms and tastes of a twenty-first-century audience. Imagine the collaborative work of animators and story editors based on feeding the story of the famous Arab sailor with a hodgepodge of mythological narratemes involving mainly the legend of Damon and Pythius which illustrates the Pythagorean ideal of friendship. Sinbad’s antagonist is drawn upon Eris, the evil Greek goddess of discord, whose name in Latin is Discordia. Upon his journey, Sinbad travels to the end of the world where he finds that the earth is flat!! Such mythological mélange drags Sinbad away from his natural habitat, forcing him to assimilate into a roughly cut pattern classical Greek and contemporary American Odyssey.

The Arab sailor is gone, replaced by a young man named Sinbad who is addicted to knavery and philandering but, surprisingly loyal to his estranged friend. As depicted in the movie, Sinbad is “the most boarish pig-headed man”, totally irresponsible and lacks any sense of honor.

The animation is breathtaking in its depiction of translucent sirens, a giant octopus-like monster, a gigantic snow-bird, battles and sea adventures as well as swordplay. It is verily a tongue-in-cheek adaptation, though. The movie, though grossed millions, is rated PG for verbal and visual sensuality as well as violence and gore.

In addition to the vivacious animation, the web-of-lies-cum-movie can also get away with even murder with the perfect alibi, the great vocal talents and star power of Brad Pitt (Sinbad), Catherine Zeta-Jones (Marina), Sinbad’s love interest, Michelle Pfeiffer (Eris) Sinbad’s nemesis, and Joseph Fiennes (Proteus) Sinbad’s friend.

Mythologies are naturally interconnected. Yet, the DreamWorks Sinbad is an artistic heist where the production ‘calls dibs’ on a legendary character from Arabian Nights only to wipe clean his cultural idiosyncrasies. No artistic endeavor has the right to deny one of the world’s greatest heroes of the phantasm of his cultural identity, (ab)using a great world cultural heritage in the name of pseudo-art.

Dr. Karma Sami is a Professor of English Drama, at the Faculty of Alsun, Ain Shams University.