Mail Order Bride

A completely original premise - Italian mobsters who curse and, are you sitting down, live in NEW JERSEY; remind you of anything? Not horrible, but a very straight-to-video production. There are a few laughs and only one embarrassingly unfunny scene (the "number one doctor in Russia" played by the late Frank "I should have sued my agent" Gorshin, who I MET, best known as the Riddler from '60s Batman). Wesley Willis fans will LOVE the romantic ballad "Stay Here In My Heart." Seriously though, the only real reason to check this movie out (which is the only reason I checked it out) is to the see the historic cast that includes both Jackie "The Joke Man" Martling AND Artie Lange (Artie replaced Jackie on The Howard Stern Show, for the four of you who didn't know that). Artie is (I'm sad to say) disappointing, but Martling undergoes a transformation from "Jackie, The Joke Man" to *gasp* "Jackie, THE VIKING;" I hope he got paid in jokes. I did a search but couldn't find whether it was produced before or after Artie officially replaced Jackie on the show. Anywho, a warning to all curious Stern fans - ARTIE AND JACKIE DON'T HAVE ANY SCENES TOGETHER! That is all.

This is without a doubt, one of the worst movies ever. I saw it at a screening where we had the bad-director-terrible-actor-atrocious-screenwriter as a guest. He seems like a nice guy, but how he ever got this movie made is beyond me. One of the producers was also a guest, and from the stories he told, I think a documentary or mockumentary about the making of this movie would have been infinitely more enjoyable. Then again, any old 8mm home movie would be more enjoyable.

The tagline: "Rule #1: Don't Trust Broads" says it all! This not-too smart, not-too funny comedy, seen at the 2003 American Film Market, is about a Russian mail-order bride who returns home with money stolen from her new American husband, a Mafia kingpin. The Family Don, played in his usual laid-back style by Danny Aiello, responds by dispatching his inept nephew (Robert Capelli, Jr. ) to retrieve the loot.

Capelli, who co-directs with Jeffrey Wolf, pursues stereotyping throughout but what came as a genuine surprise to me were the Russian locations. I thought I'd never see the day an American film company could stage a comedy car chase around the outer walls of the Kremlin. In a related scene, a couple are walking across Red Square and pause at the entrance of Lenin's Tomb. "Who's in there?," asks the American. His Russian companion replies: "The Devil" Vladimir Ilyich must be turning in his grave!

Even by the straight-to-video, D movie standards, "Mail Order Bride" is simply too preposterous for words. Wow! I thought I've seen some crap in my time, but there's simply no preparing for this turd shower.

From one of the lamest plots in the history of American cinema over to the fact I've heard more authentic-sounding dialogue in many porn flicks, the English language may not be descriptive enough to convey how horrendous this stinker really is.

How do obviously horrible movies like this one get made? Even if I can somehow grasp the misguided motivation of Robert Capelli Jr., an apparent self delusional NYC goombah turned not only actor, but also screenwriter and director, I'm truly at a loss when it comes to understanding the money trail. Taking the production over to Russia and shooting on location in Moscow couldn't have been cheap - surely someone must have put up some major cash to make that happen. Who are these wonderful benefactors? Who looked at this script, agreed with the assertion about it "possessing some big-screen potential" and forked over a certain amount of dough? And how many others repeated the above sequence in one way or another?

I demand answers! There really should be some kind of tangible punishment for enabling film-making this maladroit.

Burying this piece of garbage in limited video release isn't enough. Public tarring and feathering of every single person who made "Mail Order Bride" financially possible is the least punishment these heinous enablers should have to endure.

PS: Artie Lange and Jackie "The Jokeman" Martling ought to pick their drinking and/or drug buddies more carefully. I can believe Jackie really did need the money back in 2003 to supplement his chochkie selling income, but what was Artie's excuse for being in this. Committing to movies while intoxicated is definitely not a good idea.

Mail Order Bride is one of the funniest movies I've seen in along time. Being in the industry I'm an avid movie watcher and I have seen my share of movies this year and none of them are head turners. I found Mail Order Bride to one of the funnier movies this year. The cast of characters are very funny including Artie Lange, Vinny Pastore and Danny Aiello. I was definately entertained and I would recommend this movie to anyone.