Unfortunately Mr. Kepple displays a complete ignorance of the background of LXG.

If he bothered to check the background, or watch the movie with an open mind, he would have easily discovered that the LXG world is an alternate timeline that has gained, or developed, certain technologies before our timeline. I believe it has been termed something like "cybersteam" or some such; I don't recall the exact phrase just now.

Mr. Kepple seems to have an unfortunately literal mind. Does he also object to Jules Vernes' From Earth to Moon on the basis that the giant cannon in the book violates the laws of physics, or that the crew, as described, would not be able to survive the trip around the moon and back, even if they did survive the "launch?"

I also suppose he objects to Spiderman, Star Wars, or Indiana Jones for the same poor science and/or lack historical accuracy...

Casey,

If the scriptwriters had thrown in an explanatory note at the beginning about that, it might have helped. Of course, the historical note they did have at the beginning was flawed, but never mind. It's a movie. I ought not have to check the background beforehand.

The difference between the three movies you listed and LXG can be boiled down to one bullet point: the former movies were really enjoyable to watch, and so well-developed that one did not concern oneself with the science or history therein. LXG could have been the same way; but sadly, it was not.

To answer Dean's question, I think the worst movies are those that have some promise in them but utterly fail.

For example, I like zombie movies because they are utterly free of pretense. Children Shouldn't Play With Dead Things was a terrible movie and poorly acted to boot... but it had no pretensions of being anything else. It was also uniformly poorly acted and poorly written, so as a viewer I could enjoy the film on its own terms, e.g., this is silly.

Now, possibly the worst movie I've ever seen was About Last Night. It was based on a really cool David Mamet play, Sexual Perversity in Chicago. The problem is the play's about half the length of a feature movie, leaving the filmmakers a lot of extra time. So they added scenes. The result was a mish-mash of truly outstanding writing, followed by total crap. The result was barely watchable. Unfulfilled promise, or uneven scene/sequence quality, can make a film truly frustrating.

Two exceptions:

A movie that is excessively boring, e.g., Random Hearts, in which the only interesting characters were dead before the opening credits, can be more unwatchable than an uneven movie.

And sometimes uneven movies have a critical mass of good stuff (sometimes it's just the visuals)and you can ignore the bad stuff (often the ending).

FWIW.

What Csey said.

I've always had a weakness for both "steampunk" and graphic novels, so I suppose I'm a biased observer. I liked the movie--what else can I say?

This question has made the rounds with both popular and unpopular movies of late, though I'm not sure I've seen it spelled out yet:
When adapting an existing work for the cinema, how important is it to "explain" the work for people unfamiliar with it?
LXG is an example of an unpopular work. Fellowship of the Ring, Spiderman and XMen are examples of popular works.

One disadvantage of LXG was that it was not entirely an origin story, while Spiderman and XMen in particular capitalized on introducing the characters as part of the storyline.
LXG introduced characters who had previous history together, such as Mrs. Harker and Mr. Gray. I saw it as a positive, since I had some familiarity with the original work, but I understand how it would be confusing to someone without that familiarity.

Does this theme make sense to anyone, or am I drawing too wide a conclusion from a small set of examples?

Ben:

Ok, I see your point. I was under the impression that the anachronisms were the major failing point for you.

What you are saying, then, is that the movie just just a dog, in general? :)

Jim: "steampunk!" That was it! Thanks. :)

Please note I have no history with the comic so I cannot comment on how well it stayed to that but I have read the other stories and found the idea in and of itself novel. I found the steampunk setting interesting but I also recognized that the technology was completely out of time and so simply took it as an alternative timeline. But I also found the interaction between the various characters to be what made the movie worth watching. The witty banter between Harker and Grey. The beautiful conversations between Nemo and Quartermain dealing with one's past. I did however get the feeling that there were pieces that would have meant more to people who had familiarity with the comics.

Overall though I feel that the movie was enjoyable. It was not great film by any means but it was enjoyable, it had witty banter, well crafted visuals, interesting ideas and characters and it was well paced. That is only my view however.