El hombre con un zapato rojo

There are many different excuses to laugh, and any film that gives us one of them falls into that big bucket we call comedy.

I don't suppose anyone knows much about what makes us laugh, but like yesterday's stock market results, everyone seems to have an opinion about failed comedy. This is a classic failed comedy, regardless of whether you thought the original French film successful.

The story is that a crew of trained professionals mistakenly assume one thing and then grind that conclusion quite literally to death. The same thing happened to the crew that made this stinker.

The women are marginally interesting. Lori singer was a real string player; here she plays the prostituting spy to a string player. Carrie Fisher was deep into her skinny drugged out highly sexed period and plays someone much the same (with a reference to Princess Leia and the wookie).

Hanks only once in a rare while really tries to act. This isn't one of those times. My own theory is that he needs a challenging director.

Ted's Evaluation -- 1 of 3: You can find something better to do with this part of your life.

This is an American remake from French film written by Ives Roberts and Francis Veber.An innocent concert violinist(Tom Hanks, in the role of the French, Pierre Richard) is wrongly targeted, then he's pursued by a corrupts CIA agents(Art La Flour, Tom Noonan, among others) led by a nasty chief(Dabney Coleman, in the role of Bernard Blier). It's all because an assistant(Edward Herrmann)to head(Charles Durning) of CIA picked the violinist when he was in the airport as a decoy to dupe his contender. Meanwhile he falls in love with a sexy girl(Lori Singer, role of Mireille Darc)who's spying him. But the villain boss orders his complete elimination .

This is an easy-going comedy with hearty humor, suspense, and a little of action . The tale involves murders, botchers spies,loving lies and quite amusing. Considerable comic talents act with hilarious perfection, they include Hanks, James Belushi and Dabney Coleman, among them. The film is plenty of gags, especial mention for the laughters with a director orchestra interpreted by David Odgen Steirs, arguing against his bumbling players Hanks acting at whole show, Belushi and Carrie Fisher who are playing 'Scherezade' by Rimski Korsakov. Catching musical score by Thomas Newman, though is composed by synthesizer and appropriate cinematography by Richard H Kline. The motion picture is regularly directed by Stan Dragoti. He's usual comedies director, such as, Love at first bite, Zorro gay and Mr Mom.

Remake of the 1972 French comedy "The Tall Blond Man With One Black Shoe" hasn't the flair needed for sophisticated spy comedy, and so instead fizzles a bit despite a colorful cast. Tom Hanks is green and occasionally shrill as a concert violinist who is mistaken for a spy by the CIA and is completely unaware that he is being followed, photographed and shot at; Lori Singer struggles with a real puzzler of a role as a beautiful agent(always back-lit)who has to seduce Hanks--but she seems so fed up with his bumbling that their romance comes as something of a shock. Jim Belushi has some fun as Hanks' musician buddy whose wife is cheating on him, but Dabney Coleman, Charles Durning and Carrie Fisher are all wasted.

A man picked randomly out of a crowd is made the target of CIA surveillance and pursuit.

As Tom Hanks himself acknowledges, the movie is not that good. The plot is okay, but a bit convoluted. The comedy is more often of the absurd kind, and I am not sure it always succeeds. Jim Belushi is rather the strong point of the comedy parts. Also, as 1980s movies end to do, a romance is thrown in for some reason... it seems somewhat forced.

What makes this movie worth watching, despite the "blah" of the overall plot and comedy, is the ensemble cast. Tom Hanks may be the star, but he probably doesn't have 50% of the screen time, because he is sharing it with Dabney Coleman, Jim Belushi, Carrie Fisher (in a small role), Charles Durning, Ed Hermann, Lori Singer, Gerrit Graham and more I'm not recalling at the moment. It is a truly impressive cast.

In this remake of the French comedy "The Tall Blonde Man with One Black Shoe", Tom Hanks plays a violinist who randomly gets selected as a spy, leading the government to turn his life upside down. There are certainly some really funny scenes here - namely anything involving plumbing - but it's really undesirable when Hollywood remakes a foreign movie. "The Man with One Red Shoe" is pretty characteristic of Tom Hanks's career before he got into serious roles: innocuously silly.

So, I recommend the original, but this one isn't bad. Just don't expect any kind of religious experience. Also starring Lori Singer, Dabney Coleman, Charles Durning, Edward Herrmann, Carrie Fisher, James Belushi and David Ogden Stiers.