Movies that are frustratingly bad are the worst sort. You really want to like them, but the film's idiocy makes it impossible. The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen is just such a film.

I want to say that I am a huge fan of the premise. The film tries to create the "first" superhero story by exploring what might happen if famous literary characters were, in fact, real and banded together to fight a common evil. The concept is brilliant and promises much more than this film is able to deliver.

The film opens with a narrative explaining that the year is 1899 and technology is threatening to change the face of the world. This is followed by a tank exploding through a wall and crashing into an otherwise secure bank. The local police simply don't know how to deal with this. From the tank emerges none other than the Phantom of the Opera and the stage is set.

It would seem that this phantom has plans to take over the world. (As a side note, I've often wondered just what the appeal of taking over the world really is. Would you really want to make an enemy of a few billion people? Wouldn't it make more sense to remain behind the scenes?) He has stages a series of catastrophes and disasters throughout the world with the thought of starting a massive world war. Apparently he thinks that he can use the confusion to quietly take over.

We are told that the Brittish government intends to recruit a league of extraordinary gentlemen to combat the new evil. They begin their team with the legendary adventurer Allan Quartermain (Sean Connery). Because it is required of these stories, Quartermain is at first reluctant, but he eventually agrees to lead the team.

He is joined by Captain Nemo (Naseeruddin Shah) and his incredible ship the Nautilus, Dorian Gray (Stuart Townsend), Tom Sawyer (Shane West), and Dr. Jeckyll and Mr. Hyde (JAson Flemmyng. These are the well-known characters, but the group is also joined by Mina Harker (Peta Wilson), who was the object of affection of Dracula and is now a vampire herself and Rodney Skinner (Tony Curran), who informs us that he stole a formula from the real Invisible Man and is now, himself, invisible.

The film takes a number of inexplicable and unexplained liberties with these characters. For instance, Mina, a vampire, freely walks around in the sunlight and this oddity is never followed up on. And Dorian Gray gained a long, youthful life from his magical painting, but did it make him immune to bullets? I also have to wonder how much of a disadvantage the average audience member is going to find themselves at if they aren't familiar with these characters. Some of this may be nitpicking, but unfortunately, the film offers up so little in the way of story that I was left with no choice but to notice all of the mistakes.

I'm willing to accept that Captain Nemo's ship has grown into a behemoth vessel that would rival a modern day aircraft carrier. However, I'm not willing to accept said ship easily cruising through the canals of Venice. I can accept a massive 6-wheeled car that performs better than a Ferrari (Batmobile anyone?), but to have that same car hurtling down the streets of Venice? Let me repeat that: hurtling down the STREETS of Venice?

The way to make a superhero movie work is to set very specific rules and then stick to them. Superman understands this. Even the more recent, and excellent, X-Men films got this right. The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen (or LXG for short) doesn't even bother to set rules to break. We are thrust into a world where anything (and it would seem everything) goes. Characters are able to change costumes simply by having the camera cut away for an instant. Literary rules set forth for the characters are casuallly tossed aside. Characters are able to switch sides on a whim and with seemingly no other motivation than simply because the script requires it.

And most inexplicably, we are expected to care for these characters and then are not given any sort of satisfactory closure for them. For instance, one key character is horribly burned and on the verge of death. We see him still alive and in considerable pain -- and then we cut away never to bring the subject up again. Did he die? Do we care?

This film begins very smartly. There is a brief hope of something great here. Then, possibly during an early unnecessary action scene, the script was hit over the head with something really heavy and rendered stupid. I really, really wanted to like this film, but its own absurdity made that impossible.