Damsels: Deborah Kara Unger – Highlander: The Final Dimension
I saw Highlander: The Final Dimension (or Highlander 3) for the first time back in 1994 in a double feature with Star Trek: Generations. The early 90’s loved its titles with colons and ST: Generations was a massive disappointment but that wonderful night of movie watching also gave me the sweet pleasure of watching one of my all-time favorite movie love scenes. Yippee!
Okay, there is far more to Highlander 3 than just this wonderful scene of a Deborah Kara Unger and Christopher Lambert doing the old mattress mambo but I was only 11 and it was one of the more memorable things in the film to me at that time. Things are a little different now, though. I can finally appreciate the movie and the darling Deborah Kara Unger for the beautiful and talented actress she was WITH her clothes on too!
Highlander 3 picked up the story of Connor Macleod several years after the events of the original but totally crapped on the ideas of the sequel. Good move. Highlander 2 was possibly the worst movie ever made and it was a miracle that this movie was ever made after that putrid mess. But life finds a way, as they say, and the immortal Connor Macleod now has a son and is living a chill life in America. Business starts picking up, however, when an old enemy from centuries past returns (Mario Van Peebles as Kane!!!!!) to take the head of the Scottish refugee.
So where does Deborah fit into all this? She, like Roxanne Hart’s character from Highlander is studying some historical stuff that leads right to the lustful Macleod. He sure does have a type. Unger must be the hottest Japanese archeologist (or whatever her title is) in history because one look from the 500 year old man and he was hooked. Needless to say, Connor and Kane fight it out and the heads roll but it all comes back to that love scene about 3/4’s of the way through the film. In that moment, Deborah Kara Unger made a fan for life in me.
