From the WAI! vault

 

Little Known Spaghetti Western actors ~ Belinda Corel

[These daily posts will cover little known actors or people that have appeared in more recent films and TV series. Various degrees of information that I was able to find will be given and anything that you can add would be appreciated.]

Belinda Corel was a Spanish actress born most likely in the early 1940s. She debuted in the theatre, from which several were musicals and because of her singing she became very successful. She also appeared in two dozen films, two of which were made in Mexico: 'Santo the Silver Masked Saint vs The Invasion of the Martians' (1967) and Puberty (1971). She continued to appear in the theater, and telenovelas and toured throughout Latin America and the United States. While living in Mexico she married and had a son. Later returning to live in Spain.

Her only Spaghetti western appearance was in “Due contro tutti” (The Terrible Sheriff) in 1962 as a saloon girl.

I cannot find any information on whether she’s still living or not.

COREL, Belinda (aka Belinda Corell, Belinda Correl) (Belinda Corell) [194?, Spain -     ] – film, TV actress, singer, married business man ? (1967-    )  mother of a son.

The Terrible Sheriff – 1962 (saloon girl)

The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen

 

The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen

 

The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen U.S.A., British title

Liga výjimečných, ‘The Exceptional League’ - Czechoslovakian title

Die Liga der außergewöhnlichen Gentlemen – German title

 

A 2003, USA, British, Germany, Czech Republic co-production [Twentieth Century Fox (Hw), Angry Films [Don Murphy] (Hw), Mediastream Dritte Film GmbH & Co. Beteiligungs KG (Munich, Ger), Angry Films (Hw), J.D. Productions & International Production Company (Cz)]

Distributors: Twentieth Century Fox (07/11/03, US), Bontofilm (08/12/03, Cz), Twentieth Century Fox

 

Producers: Don Murphy, Sean Connery

Director Stephen Norrington

Story: Alan Moore

Screenplay: James Dale Robinson

Cinematography: Dan Laustsen; Ed: Paul Rubell

Music: Trevor Jones

Running time: 110

MPAA: 39870

Budget: $78,000,000; Gross: $179,265,204

 

Cast:

Allan Quartermain – Sean Connery

Captain Nemo - Naseeruddin Shah

Mina Harker – Peta Wilson,

Rodney Skinner, an Invisible Man – Tony Curran

Dorain Gray – Stuart Townsend

Tom Sawyer – Shane West

Dr. Henry Jekyll & Mr. Edward Hyde – Jason Flemyng

‘M’ – Richard Roxburgh

Sanderson Reed – Tom Goodman-Hill

Nigel – David Hemmings

American Marksmen - Pavel Bezdek, Stanislav Adamickij, James Babson

African Witch Doctor - Semere-Ab Etmet Yohannes

 

Story: 1899. In an alternate Victorian Age Steam-Punk world, a group of famous contemporary fantasy, science fiction, and adventure characters team up on a secret mission to thwart the mysterious ‘Fantom’ in his attempt to start a war between Britain and Germany.

Filmed in Hungary, the Czech Republic and Malta. Highly enjoyable adaptation of the SteamPunk graphic novel THE LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN, written by Alan Moore & illustrated by Kevin O'Neill (DC Comics, US and Vertigo, UK). Both the novel and the film drew upon the literary works of Jules Verne (Captain Nemo, 1870-75), H. G. Wells (Invisible Man, 1897), Bram Stoker (Dracula, 1897), Herman Melville (Moby Dick, 1851), Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (Moriarty, 1893), H. Rider Haggard (Quatermain, 1885-87), Ian Fleming (James Bond’s ‘M’, 1953), Oscar Wilde (Dorian Gray, 1890), Edgar Allan Poe (Rue Morgue, 1841), Gaston Leroux (Phantom, 1909), and Mark Twain (Tom Sawyer, 1876). All the above references are suitably Victorian. Both the graphic novel and the film had ‘Sawyer’ amongst its League members and as a tougher version of Twain’s character.

     Jules Verne’s Captain Nemo had recently been portrayed in the American Civil War set adventures that had been shot elsewhere: THE MYSTERIOUS ISLAND (Herbert Lom, 1961, filmed in Spain and the U.K), CAPTAIN NEMO AND THE UNDERWATER CITY (Robert Ryan, 1969, in UK) and THE MYSTERIOUS ISLAND OF CAPTAIN NEMO (Omar Sharif, 1973, Spain).

     Lead Sean Connery, as Allan Quatermain, gets to say when asked about his own slow arrival in London, “Not as good as Phineas Fogg”, a nod towards Verne’ s AROUND THE WORLD IN 80 DAYS, three of which (1989, 2004 and 2021) had a “American Cowboy’ character, and were filmed abroad (Italy and Yugoslavia; Germany and Thailand; and Romania, respectively). The 1956 “Around the World in 80 Days” also had ‘Cowboys & Indians’ running around but was filmed Stateside.

[Olsany Cemetery - Vinohradská, Prague, Czech Republic]

     Brit Jason Flemyng must have felt at home, as he had just appeared in Twentieth Century Fox’s and writer Alan Moore & illustrator Kevin O'Neill’s first part of their graphic Extraordinary Gentleman tapestry, “From Hell” (2001), about Jack the Ripper. It too was filmed in the Czech Republic, but Flemyng there played a different character.

     In THE LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN, American Shane West played a gun toting-quick-draw tougher Tom Sawyer. A few years earlier actor West had first encountered Stoker’s Count, in “Dracula 2000” (US /Canada), minus Mina. Clearly, he and Sean Connery had fun playing around with the American revolvers and Winchesters and appear suitably ‘frontier like’.  Connery comes across more comfortable this time around than he had in 1968’s filmed in Spain SHALAKO. The inclusion of an armed Tom Sawyer compares greatly to the addition of “Billy the Kid” to the cast of characters in “Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure” (1989), which happened to be filmed around Rome, Italy, and its Medieval Castles and terrain.

     The most recent Quatermain, at the time, had been Richard Chamberlain in the Israeli financed pair of film clunkers, “King Solomon's Mines” (1985) and “Allan Quatermain and the Lost City of Gold” (1986).

     Aussie Peta Wilson (TV’s “Nikita”) played Bram Stoker’s Mina Harker, lifted from the pages of “Dracula” (UK, 1897), as Jonathon Harker’s dead widow and she gets to breathe life into the role.

     Brit David Hemmings, who appears early on, had been involved in the production end of THE LEGEND OF FRENCHIE KING (1970), died just months after THE LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN premiered. 

     The deliciously named ‘M’ at first conjures up Ian Flemming’s ‘James Bond’s’ no-nonsense boss ‘M’, but as we later learn that he is actually-Sherlock Holmes’ arch villain ‘James Moriarty’, created by Sir. Arthur Conan Doyle. Connery must have had some relish in delivering the line, ‘Don’t move ‘M’, or would you prefer Professor James Moriarty…”. The line added greatly to the proceedings.    

     Canadian Carol Spier, David Cronenberg’s production designer, did the same bang-up job here.

     Nice touch has Jason Flemyng’s grotesque subconscious Mr. Edward Hyde at times mirrored in glass, of different types, rather than be physically present.

[Production dates Jun 28, 2002 - Nov 24, 2002]

     The ever-youthful Dorian Gray carries a solid gold German Luger handgun, much the way the protagonist of RINGO AND HIS GOLDEN PISTOL (1966) had his colt decked out.

Due to the problems on set and with the studio on THE LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN, all three of the principals, director Stephen Norrington (his fourth film), scripter James Dale Robinson & Sir. Sean Connery all rethought their career choices and each pretty much retired. Pity.

 

By Michael Ferguson