Friday, 19 May 2000

WEEKEND PREVIEW

And so begins the time of the flat mega-hit.

This column has been in this funk about Gladiator for weeks. No matter how many times I write that I like the film…and I do…people who LOVE the film write in claiming that I am trying to destroy the greatest movie of the year. Well, it's not the greatest movie of the year. It's not a likely Oscar nominee, except in below-the-line categories. And it is far from perfect. But it may be the best film of the first two months of summer.

Now, there are a lot of films to come before Me, Myself & Irene and Chicken Run grace the June 23rd weekend. Mission: Impossible 2, Shanghai Noon, Big Momma's House, Gone in 60 Seconds, Shaft, Titan A.E. and Boys & Girls are all coming, and who knows what they may be?

Box Office Extra counts the dollars here after noon e.s.t

THE GOOD, THE BAD & THE UGLY: What I do know is that Road Trip ain't no Animal House or American Pie and that Dinosaur ain't no Jurassic Park or even Pocahontas.

Neither movie sucks. But neither movie is great. And I hold neither to the standards to which I hold Gladiator because neither really aspires to "greatness." Road Trip wants to be an amiable, silly, wild, sexy teen comedy and Dinosaur wants to dazzle you with visual images while telling a very, very simple story.

Road Trip is the better of the duo, for my $8. The one truly inspired element is Tom Green. While I'm not the biggest fan of his MTV show, he does have a powerful on-screen persona. And his scenes deliver laughs. Unfortunately, he is a sidebar to the movie, not the star, despite the extremely misleading advertising campaign. Of course, you could make the analogy to John Belushi and Bluto Blutarsky in Animal House. He wasn't the star, but oh was he the star! But that speaks to the biggest difference between Road Trip and American Pie...the casting. All the kids in Road Trip seem very, very nice. And no doubt, there is talent there. But that cast in American Pie is made up of the next generation of stars. (Note: Seann William Scott is in both films, but you sure get the feeling that they hired this talented actor to connect with A.P.'s audience. Particularly when you realize how underused he is in Road Trip.) Chris Klein is a rising star, already having appeared in the greatness that is Election before Pie hit. Tara Reid was already in the Coen Bros. family (The Big Lebowski). Mena Suvari was the American Beauty. Jason Biggs is in major demand and has two films coming out this summer, including the dark horse smash-hit candidate, Loser. Chris Owen, Natasha Lyonne and movie-stealing Alyson Hannigan were already established faces. And Shannon Elizabeth was THE pin-up girl of 1999.

Road Trip's cast doesn't fail their acting duties. But there is not nearly the sheen. Breckin Meyer's been a teenager for a decade. Amy Smart and Rachel Blanchard are both fine, but get short shrift in this story. Fred Ward seems to be picking up a check that had fallen off his desk seven years ago. Andy Dick gets big laughs, but needs to show I.D. to prove he's not really Tom Green in disguise. With due respect to Paulo Costanzo, he seems like a Jason Biggs stand-in. The big bet for DreamWorks is DJ Qualls, who is okay, but Charlie Korsmo's turn in what is essentially the same role in Can't Hardly Wait kicks DJ's skinny butt all over the place. And what the hell is Ethan Suplee doing in this movie in a non-role? I could have sworn he had a career happening!

Perhaps the stupidest analysis of this movie came from a friend, who I will allow to remain anonymous, who pronounced that Road Trip's semen joke was much richer and much funnier than American Pie's. In fact, American Pie's joke was one of his points of rage regarding that movie. Suffice it to say that the real reason he prefers the (literal) gag in Road Trip was that the method of obtaining the "sample" was far more appealing to him. Two fingers up! Way up!

There are laughs in this movie. But hype being what it is, the media has raised the bar. If I had to compare it laugh-for-laugh, I'd say that it's about at the level of, say, the Eddie Murphy/Martin Lawrence movie Life. Or perhaps something like Chris Farley's Tommy Boy. If you want to make Animal House comparisons, just think about the frat sequence in Road Trip versus the "Can We Dance With Your Dates?" section of Animal House. Find me one line that will be repeated as often as "Pledge pin!" or "double secret probation" or "Fat, drunk, and stupid is no way to go through life, son." Find one prop as memorable as the cucumber in the grocery store, the toilet paper in the bra, the horse in Dean Wormer's office or the ladder smashing against the sorority house wall. It doesn't mean that many of you won't enjoy Road Trip. But it tries to be rude and crude more than it succeeds in that way that makes you laugh even when you don't want to laugh. And I think it deserves mention that an overweight black woman as a sight gag in bed with a skinny white boy is not a smart gag. It is unkind. Think about how smartly American Pie took its turn with Alyson Hannigan. There is no joke in all of Road Trip that is as thought out as that classic moment.

"B,G&E Goes Jurassic and Parody Paradise"