Friday, 30 June 2000

WEEKEND PREVIEW

It's The Patriot vs. The Perfect Storm vs. The Moose & The Squirrel.

First things first. Mel and The Wave will do what Boris & Natasha could never handle. Moose & Squirrel will be crushed. But that was an easy call, even if I don't think the crushing is necessary. (See "The Good" below.)

So what of Mel vs. George & Mark & The Funky Bunch on a Boat? Well, I suspect that it will be a lot closer than a lot of people think. For starters, because of its running time, The Patriot will lose at least one screening a day over the five-day weekend vs. The Perfect Storm. Perhaps two in theaters that run late night shows. So, to be even for the weekend, The Patriot needs to sell about 20 percent more tickets to their screenings than The Perfect Storm. That's no gimme, no matter what your tracking figures say.

Interestingly enough, the last two Fourth of July weekends had $36 million three-day openers with Armageddon and Wild Wild West. How much greater is the must-see this year than it was the last two years. Not much, it seems to me. In my eyes, The Patriot has the cleaner, clearer ad campaign. You know exactly what you are supposed to be getting when you see the ads and trailers for the movie. In my opinion, The Perfect Storm is a lot more intimate and a lot more human than the advertising leads you to believe. This weekend, people will be coming for that wave.

And don't write off The Adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle completely. With Dinosaur, Titan A.E. and Fantasia 2000 all used up and Chicken Run as the only clear choice for parents over a five-day weekend, Rocky & Bullwinkle may surprise.

But let's save the box office obsessions for Box Office Extra, right here after noon e.s.t.

THE GOOD: There have been two huge shocks for me this summer. One, how badly The Patriot mangles its second half after achieving near perfection for the first hour. And two, how much I really enjoyed The Adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle. Critics out there will be mangling this movie, be assured. But it seems to me that they mostly just didn't get the joke. Even roughcut's own J. Rentilly seemed to be unwilling to go along for the punny ride. When he writes of Piper Perabo's character as "an idealistic FBI rookie named Sympathy," he shows his lack of Rocky & Bullwinkle connectivity. Her name is KAREN Sympathy. As in Care and Sympathy. Get it? If you don't and you don't want to, you too will hate this movie. Go back to Pottsylvania!

This movie captures the spirit of cartoon silliness better than any cartoon-based comedy ever made. It blows Inspector Gadget out of the water. It makes Dudley Do-Right look as wrong as it was. The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles were close. But this one takes the cake. I laughed from the very start to the very end. And like the cartoon series it was based on, sometimes I laughed out loud and sometimes I just smirked. But the spirit was dead on and I had a lot of fun. Even the stuff that looked absolutely terrible in the advertising works in the context of the movie. I don't think that De Niro's self-mockery of his Taxi Driver performance is funny in the trailer. Whoopi Goldberg just looks silly in the ads screeching, "Rocky and Bullwinkle!" Bullwinkle being carried on the shoulders of college kids seems way too self-congratulatory. But all three moments worked for me--and for the audience of critics I watched it with--in the theater.

And on top of the R&B laughs, there are a load of cameos that a good for smile after smile, including Jonathan Winters, Norman Lloyd, Janeane Garofalo, Don Novello, Firesign alum Phil Proctor, a virtually unrecognizable Billy Crystal and more.

Jay Ward's genius was in not underestimating the intelligence of his audience. You could always laugh at the silliness of his cartoons, but if you had a little information, you could laugh as the layers of other stuff that was going on in the script and in some of the visual gags. The fate of Frostbite Falls is not about what has happened to America, but about what happens to a cancelled TV show. The President of the United States isn't really interested in saving the world, just getting re-elected. And these TV cartoon characters have to save the world from…TV.

This is the simple scoop on this movie. If you love Rocky & Bullwinkle, you will probably enjoy this movie. If you are a Pottsylvanian nogoodnik who wants to worry about plot structure and depth, you are going to hate every minute.

One sad note. Bullwinkle never tries to pull a rabbit out his hat. Not once. I guess they're saving it for the sequel.

"Someone is Dead & Roger Ebert is a Real Live ROTD"