MOVIE REVIEW : ‘HOTEL COLONIAL’: HALF-BAKED EFFORT

“Hotel Colonial” (at the Beverly Center Cineplex) is half-baked Graham Greene. It has the lush, exotic locales of a Greene saga but without Greene’s rich characterizations, wit or irony to make the trip worth the effort.

Not helping matters is the tinny, post-synced sound of this English-language, mainly Italian production, which has Vera Cruz and environs standing in for Colombia, all gorgeously photographed by the eminent Giuseppe Rotunno. It was routinely directed by Cinzia TH Torrini, who also had a hand in the script.

John Savage stars in this drawn-out fable of innocence and evil as an idealistic young Italian-American who goes to Bogota to claim the body of his brother, a turncoat Red Brigade terrorist who has supposedly committed suicide. When a corpse shown him by authorities is not that of his brother, Savage commences an interminable investigation that leads him deep into the Amazon jungle and a meeting with a totally corrupt and cynical drug kingpin, played all-stops-out by Robert Duvall.

The journey is so lackluster and protracted that it’s too late for Duvall to bring the film to life. But he is great, campy fun in his blond-wigged, heavily Spanish-accented flamboyance--a gleeful villain who keeps a hawk as a pet, loves to wrestle with alligators and giant anacondas and wreaks unspeakable horrors on the Indians.

Of course, that Duvall is so much larger than life destroys any possibility of taking the film seriously--but then it is much too trite to do so in the first place.

Rachel Ward is around briefly as an Italian-accented amoral type who likes Savage well enough to try to wise him up, and Italian comedian Massimo Troisi is welcome as a happy-go-lucky ferry- boat operator. Savage is likable and credible but his role is too colorless for him to do much with it.

But the real star of “Hotel Colonial” (rated R for standard violence) is its backdrop--picturesque villages, seedy bars and hotel rooms, a squalid jail and finally, the jungle itself.

‘HOTEL COLONIAL’ An Orion-Hemdale release of a Legeis Theatrical, Inc. production. Executive producers William Siegel, Mauro Berardi, John Daly, Derek Gibson. Producer Ira R. Barmak. Director Cinzia TH Torrini. Screenplay Enzo Monteleone, Torrini, Robert Katz, Giuseppe Rotunno. Music Pino Donaggio. Art director Giantito Burchiellaro. Associate producer Andy Howard. Associate producers for Mexico: Angel Flores Marini, Othon Roffiel F. Film editor Nino Baragli. With John Savage, Robert Duvall, Rachel Ward, Massimo Troisi.

Running time: 1 hour, 43 minutes.

MPAA rating: R (Under 17 requires an accompanying parent or adult guardian.)