‘Element’ Of Surprise Dont’ Let The Twisted Plot Of ‘Fifth Element’ Bother You, Just Enjoy The Show

“The Fifth Element” is the campiest, most incomprehensible, hammiest, most bizarre, most irrelevance-crammed piece of movie lunacy I’ve seen this decade.

I rather liked it.

I can’t call it “good,” since it’s as disorganized as Serbian politics. I can’t recommend it to a soul with any surety my advice is sound. But it’s a 10-ring circus: If you don’t like the unicycle-riding bears, just wait for the juggling orangutans.

Graduate theses might be written on Luc Besson and Robert Mark Kramer’s script without explaining it. I’ll try to sum it up.

In 1914, titanic scarab beetles from another galaxy visit an Egyptian temple to pick up four sacred stones that can save the universe when combined with a “fifth element.” They promise to return in 300 years, bringing back the stones when ultimate evil threatens our planet. (Hey, Beetleboys - why not leave the stones here and send us this fifth element ASAP?)

In 2214, a giant ball of fire approaches the planet, commanded by unseen Mr. Shadow. It eats all the communications satellites in outer space. Arms dealer Zorg (Gary Oldman, who’s outrageous even for him) is Mr. Shadow’s emissary on Earth, aided by boar-monster warriors whom he betrays and who later betray him.

Luckily, the Scarabeans have sent the fifth element to Earth. She’s an orange-haired creature named Leeloo (Milla Jovovich), who has acrobatic skills and super-strength and can learn languages within minutes. She assisted by a nervous priest (Ian Holm) and a New York taxi driver named Korben Dallas (Bruce Willis), who used to be a Special Forces agent.

Zorg, Dallas, Leeloo, the boar creatures and the priest all go after the stones, which have been swallowed by an eight-foot, blue-skinned, tentacled opera singer. Did I mention Ruby Rhod (comedian Chris Tucker), the shrieking, lipsticked queen who has an intergalactic radio show and ends up as Dallas’ right-hand er, man?

You have to give Besson, who directed, credit for audacity. Who else would make Tiny Lister, the mountainous ex-wrestler, president of the Federation of Planets? Who else would make Brion James the leader of the good guys’ army? (I guess he’s in there to strengthen those “Blade Runner” parallels.)

But couldn’t Besson have made some effort to straighten out this serpentine plot? Couldn’t he have decided whether the film was exciting, touching or ridiculous? It aims for all three and ends up with none. The jolting special effects redeem it, but to what point?

Willis has an engagingly easygoing manner, Jovovich achieves a little pathos, Tucker’s a hoot as a guy so swishy he makes Little Richard look like Jim Brown. (I wonder why Rhod keeps having mad heterosexual sex, and why women find him irresistible.)

Oldman’s in a different league, an interplanetary league of overacting. His skull is covered half by a plastic sheath, half by a hairdo that’s a cross between Hitler’s and the Pharoah’s in “The Ten Commandments.” He sports a limp, a jazz trumpeter’s wisp of beard, an overbite and a Southern accent that sounds like Elvis Presley impersonating Andy Warhol. In an awful way, he’s as fascinatingly messy as a train wreck.

MEMO: This sidebar appeared with the story: “The Fifth Element” Location: East Sprague, Newport, Coeur d’Alene and Post Falls Six. Credits: Directed by Luc Besson, starring Bruce Willis, Gary Oldman, Ian Holm, Milla Jovovich, Chris Tucker, Luke Perry, Brion James, Tommy Lister Jr. Running time: 2:07 Rating: R