Banana Joe

Of course I was familiar with the 1982 movie "Banana Joe", as I had watched it in my childhood. However, I only very vaguely remember the movie, and thus I opted to sit down and watch it again here in 2024, as I was presented with the opportunity to do so.

Writers Mario Amendola, Bruno Corbucci, Steno and Carlo Pedersoli (Bud Spencer's actual name), put together an enjoyable script and storyline. Sure, one might argue that "Banana Joe" is an archetypical Bud Spencer movie, and right they are. But this form is what works and it is these types of movies that Bud Spencer made so well. So of course it was quite enjoyable to watch him in this 1982 action comedy from director Steno. It is a story that takes the audience wide and far as Banana Joe goes on quite an adventure.

Of course I was only familiar with Bud Spencer on the entire cast list. But it should be noted that the acting performances in the movie were generally good.

If you enjoy the old movies starring Bud Spencer and Terrence Hill, then you definitely will also like "Banana Joe" from director Steno.

My rating of "Banana Joe" lands on a six out of ten stars.

Banana Joe(Bud Spencer) is a corpulent and kind illiterate living on a tropical island in the Caribe. He trades bananas when a mobster named Torsillo wishes to take his commerce. Then , for first time in his existence, he goes to big city for getting an identity certificate . There he knows a beautiful singer named Dorianne(Marina), facing off dangers, truck racers(with usual Peplum, Nello Pazzafini as a Torsillo's truck driver) and several adventures.

This is a good amusing juvenile for Bud Spencer fans, but he's delight; it packs action, fist-play, slapdash, humor with tongue and check and is quite entertaining. This release has some cool and even hilarious moments, though the Terence Hill-Bud Spencer duo films are better. The film isn't always good , sometimes is fresh and diverting and on a couple of memorable occasions ,it's frankly delicious. The movie displays innumerable laughters and slapstick, including a sour satyr about bureaucracy and the army when Banana Joe is forced to enlist for obtaining a identity document. Sympathetic screenplay by the usual, Mario Amendola, Bruno Corbucci and Carlo Perdesoli(alias Bud Spencer). Catching musical score with noisy songs by Guido and Mauricio De Angelis(Spaghetti Western habitual). The motion picture is professionally directed by Steno, Stefano Vanzina(father of Carlo Vanzina). He wrote and directed in the 60s Toto vehicles(Toto vs the four, Two colonels); Walter Chiari and Raimondo Vianello shows(Heroes of the West, Twins from Texas). In the 70s and 80s directed Bud Spencer movies about Flatfoot or Rizzo, also called Piedone, such as, Flatfoot in Hong Kong, Piedone in Africa, Flatfoot in Egypt. And in the 80s directed TV series , the Professore Jack Clementi, again with Bud Spencer.

Joe is a good man, that lives in a south American forest commercing bananas in surrounding villages. He doesn't have a surname, an identity document, a selling licence: this became a problem when local crime attempt to seize the bananas commerce of the state...... A good comedy, ironic (in the style of Corbucci), and with the usual iron punch of Bud Spencer! (here without his classic buddy Terence Hill).

Bud Spencer lives in a small village. He transports the bananas they grow to the nearest city in a ramshackle barge. He never sets foot on the shore. The village, the river, and the boat are his world. But crooked businessman Gianfranco Barra has bribed his way into a license to build a banana factory and a casino in Spencer's village. And Spencer does not have a license to deal in bananas. As far as the law is concerned, he doesn't exist.

All of which sounds like it could be a dire tale of a natural man ground by the millstones of so-called civilization. Fortunately, Spencer co-wrote the script, so it turns into a story about how civilization cannot contain him, with plenty of gag sequences. None are particularly original, but Spencer and his cast mates perform them with evident gusto, which goes a long way towards making this funny. From his straightforward courtship of Marina Langner, to the depredations of con man Mario Scarpetta, to drill sergeant Giorgio Bracardi, it's an amiable, loose-jointed comedy.

This movie has been in my mind for a while because I watched it when I was a little kid and I have fond memories of it, and because I found this movie very funny in my child mind, I decided to rewatch it after more than 30 years, and after I finished Banana Joe, I realized why I found it so funny when I was a child because this movie is so silly and dumb in every sense and only a 7-year-old child can find it funny.

When I was a child, my family had one television, and there was only one channel, so I had no choice other than Saturday cartoons. I remember this movie being frequently shown every Sunday, and it seemed fun, so I watched it. This movie was made in 1982, which is the year I was born, and I have to say its humor is not only terribly aged; it's also so juvenile and idiotic, and the editing is terribly done; unrelated scenes just merge with each other without any sense; all characters are basically cartoony caricatures or stereotypes, so actors played these characters with exaggerated manners; and the main character is big, burly, uncivilized, illiterate, and dumb as a rock banana seller. He didn't know his surname or his family; he didn't have an identification card or a license for trading bananas. As an American, he also didn't know how he came to Colombia. Is he an illegal immigrant, or was he just born here? We just didn't know about this character. Plot, which is about a cartoony capitalistic dude who wants to build a factory Banana Joe's small village and our big hero try to prevent his mission and get a trading license in some comedic situations and adventures that are so silly and cheesy. There are also some pathetic attempts to create physical comedy, which only little kids can find amusing and laugh at.

If you consider this movie a kid's movie, that's fine, but Banana Joe lasts more than 1:30 hours, so for an adult audience, it's just a waste of time. I just watched this movie for nostalgic purposes, and I don't regret spending time on this silly and stupid movie, despite the fact that I probably lost a few digits from my IQ. I also want to say that I love the exotic and tropical southern Colombian settings and catchy background music, but that's the only positive thing I can say about this outdated movie.