Year of the Comet
Year of the Comet
PG-13 | 24 April 1992 (USA)
Year of the Comet Trailers

Year of the Comet is a 1992 romantic comedy adventure film about the pursuit of the most valuable bottle of wine in history. The title refers to the year it was bottled, 1811, which was known for the Great Comet of 1811, and also as one of the best years in history for European wine.

Reviews
Tedfoldol everything you have heard about this movie is true.
Gurlyndrobb While it doesn't offer any answers, it both thrills and makes you think.
Myron Clemons A film of deceptively outspoken contemporary relevance, this is cinema at its most alert, alarming and alive.
Nicole I enjoyed watching this film and would recommend other to give it a try , (as I am) but this movie, although enjoyable to watch due to the better than average acting fails to add anything new to its storyline that is all too familiar to these types of movies.
Robert J. Maxwell Take "39 Steps" and add variations on the theme. Here you get two MacGuffins for the price of one. Louis Jordan and his handful of goons are after a youth formula concealed in the label on a bottle of Napoleon's Lafitte 1811 in the secret wine cellar of a castle on the Isle of Skye. The bottle itself, the size of a rather large fire extinguisher, is worth millions of dollars all by itself. A sweet old Scottish lady learns of the bottle and dispatches her son to steal it. "Ken I kill 'em?", he asks. The old lady shakes her head in loving resignation, "Ach, what's a mother to dew? Only if you have tew." The mother and son plot is soon dispensed with and Jourdan becomes the chief villain. The pursuit takes them to the French Riviera for reasons I didn't understand.Penelope Ann Miller is the wine expert who discovers the ancient bottle. She soon picks up a young man as a companion, Tim Daly, who flies helicopters, falls in love with Miller, and owns a billion dollar corporation. Does she reciprocate? Does he get to show off his rock-hard abs? Do the loving pair defeat Jourdan? Does he wind up buying Napoleon's wine? Do they taste the wine at the couple's wedding? Has the wine turned to vinegar? Are you kidding? The screenplay is by William Goldman, a pro who has produced some interesting things among a cloud of clunkers. It was directed by Peter Yates, which is hard to believe because this playful romantic story of wine snobs and thieves is so different from his distinctive work on films like "Bullitt", "Marathon Man," and "Robbery." Even Yates' failure, like "Murphy's War," are exceptional. This story isn't. It's rather like a cartoon.Penelope Ann Miller is a strange actress. There nothing strange about her appearance. She's pretty in a way that some women in the local supermarket are pretty. She's by no means stunning, as, say, somebody with more exotic looks is, like Madeleine Stowe. And she's not extraordinarily sexy, like Elizabeth Hurley or Angelina Jolie. She looks like one of the more attractive girls in a high school chemistry class, the sort that some of the young men with too many pimples dream about before they go to sleep. Her profile is perfect and belongs on an old Medici coin. She's not an outstanding actress, although still competent and affecting.Compared to Tim Daly, she is Eleanora Duse. Daly is brusquely handsome, I guess, in a Magnum PI kind of way, and he's constantly compelled to run around in a bath towel so we see his abs and sinewy limbs and those brachial veins like logs. His performance belongs in a television movie. I didn't like him. I'm staggeringly handsome myself but I'm reminded of a New Yorker cartoon. Two hippos are in the river staring at a gazelle drinking from the bank. One hippo says to the other, "I hate her." Why should Miller wind up in Daly's arms instead of mine? He can pay five million dollars for a bottle of stupid wine and I can't. There is no other rational explanation.But here is Louis Jourdan. He hardly needs that youth serum. He was 70 when this was shot and he looks just fine. His voice is still that Gallic baritone, though perhaps a little gravelly. He's slim, well-dressed, debonair, as usual, and has a chance to overact unconscionably and seems to be enjoying himself. Good for him.There are some picture-postcard shots of Scotland that are very appealing. Less so, the Riviera. But the overall impact of the film is minor, as if everyone -- writer, director, performers, crew -- were all on vacation, breezing along with the breeze. If you don't expect too much, it can distract you for an hour and a half.
Wampusdude The movie revolves around Penelope Ann Miller's character discovering, first a hidden wine cellar at a castle she's sent to catalog for her father's auction house.Then she found a case holding a very large bottle...possibly Balthazar or even Nebudchannazer, of a 1811 Ch. Lafite...from a Year of the Comet, a vintage much more successful than the later 1887 Year of the Comet. Haley's, that is.The movie becomes a romantic adventure-comedy, with Tim Daly pulling the Hero parts off. Louis Jourdan has the role of Mad Scientist, which he'd become excellent at :)The huge surprise comes at the end, when the bottle is auctioned off and a surprise bidder buys it. And THEN shocks EVERYONE in the auction room by OPENING it. And selling glasses for, I think, ten-thousand dollars a glass, made out to a favorite charity.Daly and Miller of course become an item.This movie is beloved of wine geeks, like me. My nick in other worlds is the Winestone Cowboy (VBG)
epratt The Year of the Comet is in a genre that is the perfect date movie. It is a romantic comedy that is in the guise of an action thriller.This was William Goldman's first original script since Butch Cassidy. The film even features two actors from the Bond films: Art Malik and Louis Jourdan.Go rent this movie if you want a surprising, unexpected treat.
domino13 This movie was poorly promoted by the companies behind it - even though it is a great movie. This is one of the best romantic comedies I have ever seen. If you liked "The Cutting Edge" or "Romancing the Stone," you will like this one. I highly recommend it!