Popeye is a 1980 American musical comedy film directed by Robert Altman and produced by Paramount Pictures and Walt Disney Productions. It is based on E. C. Segar's Popeye comics character. The script was written by Jules Feiffer, and stars Robin Williams as Popeye the Sailor Man and Shelley Duvall as Olive Oyl. Its story follows Popeye's adventures as he arrives in the town of Sweethaven.

Popeye premiered December 6, 1980, in Los Angeles, California, and opened in the rest of the United States the following week, distributed by Paramount Pictures, with Disney handling international distribution through Buena Vista International. During opening weekend, the film grossed $6.3 million, ultimately taking in $60 million worldwide, against a budget of $20 million. When originally released, Popeye received negative reviews from critics, Hoffman dropped out due to creative differences with Feiffer. Gilda Radner was also considered for the Olive Oyl role. Radner's manager, Bernie Brillstein, discouraged her from taking the part, due to his concerns about the quality of the script, and worries of her working for months on an isolated set with Evans and Altman, both known for erratic behavior and unorthodox creative methods.

In December 1979, Walt Disney Productions joined as part of a two-picture production deal (including Dragonslayer), with Paramount Pictures handling the North American distribution, and Buena Vista International at the international distribution.

Principal photography commenced on January 23, 1980. The film was shot in Malta. According to Barry Diller, cocaine was heavily used on set, saying, "You couldn't escape it." He also said that "film cans were actually being used to ship cocaine back and forth to this set." The elaborate Sweethaven set was constructed beyond what was needed for filming, adding to the cost and complexity of the production, along with a recording studio, editing facilities and other buildings, including living quarters. Filming wrapped on June 19, 1980, three weeks over schedule, due to bad weather. Parish wrote that Robin Williams referred to this set as "Stalag Altman".

Parish noted other production problems. Evans insisted that the screenplay reflect the comic-strip Popeye, and not the "distorted" cartoon version. Feiffer's script went through several rewrites, and he expressed concern that too much screen time was being devoted to minor characters. Feiffer also disliked Harry Nilsson's songs, saying that they were not right for the film. Popeye's original muscle arms formed of silicone rubber were difficult for Williams to manipulate and remove after filming, so two Italian artisans were brought to Malta to remake them, and Altman had to juggle his shooting schedule. He also had the cast sing some musical numbers during filming, breaking with the traditional movie-musical practice of actors recording the songs in a studio first, and lip-synching. This reduced the sound quality, due to difficulties in accurately capturing the voices. Williams rerecorded much of his dialogue, due to trouble with his character's mumbling style, partly as a byproduct of talking with a pipe in his mouth. His penchant for ad-libs led to clashes with Altman. The final battle involving the octopus was complicated by the mechanical beast's malfunction. After the production cost rose beyond $20 million, Paramount ordered Altman to wrap filming and return to California with what he had.

Release

Popeye premiered at the Mann's Chinese Theater in Los Angeles on December 6, 1980, two days before what would have been E. C. Segar's 86th birthday. In the United Kingdom, the film was released on also on VHS and DVD by Walt Disney Home Video, with the shortened 92-minute runtime.

Reception

Box office

The film grossed $6 million on its opening weekend in the United States, and made $32,000,000 after 32 days. The film earned $49,823,037

Although the film's gross was quite successful, especially considering the much lower price of theater tickets at the time, the film was not the mega-blockbuster that Paramount and Disney had expected, and thus some wrote it off as a disappointment. Altman, once critically admired, was shunned in Hollywood. His decade-long career decline included a move to Paris, where he directed low-budget film adaptations of stage plays.

Critical response

Reviews at the time were generally negative, but the film has been more positively reappraised over time.

Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times gave the film 3.5 stars out of 4, writing that Duvall was "born to play" Olive Oyl, and with Popeye, Altman had proved "it is possible to take the broad strokes of a comic strip and turn them into sophisticated entertainment." Gene Siskel of the Chicago Tribune awarded 3.5 out of 4, writing that the first 30 minutes were "tedious and totally without a point of view", but once Swee'Pea was introduced the film "then becomes quite entertaining and, in a few scenes, very special". Richard Combs of The Monthly Film Bulletin wrote, "In its own idiosyncratic fashion, it works." Vincent Canby of The New York Times called it "a thoroughly charming, immensely appealing mess of a movie, often high-spirited and witty, occasionally pretentious and flat, sometimes robustly funny and frequently unintelligible. It is, in short, a very mixed bag."

Other critics were unfavorable, such as Leonard Maltin, who described the picture as a bomb: "E.C. Segar's beloved sailorman boards a sinking ship in this astonishingly boring movie. A game cast does its best with an unfunny script, cluttered staging, and some alleged songs. Tune in a couple hours' worth of Max Fleischer cartoons instead; you'll be much better off." Variety wrote that all involved "fail to bring the characters to life at the sacrifice of a large initial chunk of the film. It's only when they allow the characters to fall back on their cartoon craziness that the picture works at all." Gary Arnold of The Washington Post wrote, "While there are things to like in this elaborately stylized, exasperating musical slapstick fantasy ... they emerge haphazardly and flit in and out of a precarious setting." Charles Champlin of the Los Angeles Times described the film as "rarely uninteresting but seldom entirely satisfying", and thought that the adult tone of the dialogue left it "uncertain what the film's target audience is intended to be." TV Guide says, "This film from director Robert Altman and scenarist Jules Feiffer adapts 'Popeye' to feature length – a good idea gone down the drain under Altman's spotty direction. Only in the last 50 minutes does Popeye create some excitement."

Accolades

The film won Worst Picture at the Stinkers Bad Movie Awards in its original ballot, and again in its expanded ballot in 2006. The film also received a Saturn Award nomination for Best Fantasy Film.

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Several authors have contrasted Popeye with subsequent comic book movies. One article calls it a "road not taken" in comic book adaptations. The author praised Popeye, Dick Tracy (1990), and Hulk (2003) for using comic techniques, such as "masking, paneling, and page layout" in ways that the DC Extended Universe and Marvel Cinematic Universe do not. An article for WBUR agreed that Popeye and Hulk were more "artistic" than modern comic movies, and said that Popeye has been "mistakenly" overlooked.

Director Phil Lord is also a fan of the film and has cited it as an inspiration: "It comes from trying not to be vain about what you're making on the surface. Like, who cares if [The Lego Movie is] based on a popular toy brand? It's still an opportunity to make something really interesting. I think we've always approached these things as a way to express ourselves personally, which no one does! Maybe it comes from watching Robert Altman's Popeye a lot."

Soundtrack

Original release

The soundtrack was composed by Harry Nilsson, who took a break from producing his album Flash Harry to score the film. He wrote all the original songs and co-produced the music with producer Bruce Robb at Cherokee Studios. The soundtrack in the film was unusual, for the actors sang some of the songs live. For that reason, the studio album did not quite match the tracks heard in the film. Van Dyke Parks is credited as music arranger.

The U.S. trailer contains the song "I Yam What I Yam" from the soundtrack album, not the film's live performance.

"I'm Popeye the Sailor Man" was composed by Sammy Lerner for the original Max Fleischer cartoon, Popeye the Sailor.

The song "Everything Is Food" was not included on the album, and the song "Din' We" (which was cut from the film) was included. In 2016, a vinyl-only limited-edition version of the album was released with two bonus tracks by Varèse Sarabande, for Record Store Day Black Friday.

2017 deluxe edition

In 2017, Varèse Sarabande released a deluxe edition that placed the songs in the original order of the film, reinstated "Everything Is Food", and included a second disc of demo versions of the songs sung by Nilsson and the cast. In 2018, fourteen of the demos were released on vinyl as Music from the Motion Picture Popeye – The Harry Nilsson Demos.

; Disc 1

; Disc 2

References

Notes

Further reading

ja:ポパイ#ポパイ（1980年実写版）