In the Army Now

This is a film that is sort of a guilty pleasure for me, what I mean by that is that its a film that I am almost ashamed to admit that I like. Pauly Shore is a lot more talented then his critics would have you believe. I am a Sergeant in the Army and on October 20th I will have ten years on active duty. I also spent six years in the National Guard and served in Operation Desert Storm. Watching military movies is fun for me because I often laugh at them and say that it is not like that in real life. This film gave me a lot of laughs. I liked the scene where Pauly dropped that grenade in basic. I would have killed him if I had been his drill sergeant. I think Lori Petty played a good part in this film. She is an underated actress who can do comedy and drama very well. People have not given her enough credit. She sort of steals the show in this movie as Christine. I was sort of reminded of my Gulf war experiences when I was watching them in the desert. I remember when our plane landed I just looked around and there was nothing only sand and thats what they see. This film understandebly never won any Oscars and I doubt if the American Film Institute will ever fight to preserve it, but it is still a nice way to waste two hours.

Although there's a lot of people who don't like Pauly Shore, apparently you either love him or hate him, I have to say that I found this film quite amusing. It takes me back to my younger days when I was a weekend warrior. The group I hung out with I'm afraid, all people who were trying to get out of the real army and Vietnam joined the reserves as I did. We were about as military a group as Pauly Shore, Andy Dick, and David Alan Grier. Back then though we were not side by side with Lori Petty. The Army in its infinite wisdom knew better than to activate our crowd for Vietnam.

But that's not what happens here. Pauly Shore and Andy Dick are a pair of misfits in civilian life and find they have a cash flow problem. That extra money for attending those Army Reserve drills sounds pretty enticing so they decide to be all that they can be on the weekends and two weeks in the summer.

But Libya and Chad go to war and like the Iraqi Desert Storm, the reserves are called up for a United Nations multi-national force. Actually Libya and Chad did have border conflicts for many years with the French attacking as protectors for Chad. Pauly, Andy, and their new friends David Alan Grier and Lori Petty are in the Sahara Desert as part of a water purification team, water boys as they're derisively called by those in the real army.

In The Army Now revives all the basic service comedy situations going all the way back to Abbott&Costello in Buck Privates. Especially in the training sequences. Pauly Shore and Andy Dick probably grew up on Bud&Lou, but they do the routines with a Generation X twist.

I liked the film and thanked God I was not in the situations that Pauly and the rest were in.

I know most people find Pauly Shore (Bio-Dome, Encino Man) to be really annoying. He can be extremely annoying, but he can also be truly funny. In the movie In the Army Now, Shore plays another one of his likable loser characters. He and his best friend, played by Andy Dick (TV's News Radio) just got fired from their jobs and need money. So they both enlist in the Army Reserves assuming they will never have to do anything. During the movie they meet some new friends, Lori Petty (Tank Girl, The Glass Shield) and David Alan Grier (McHale's Navy). Pauly Shore and Andy Dick decide to join the water purification unit and Shore displays a real talent for that. Of course, a war starts and they get sent into Libya to help out the troops by purifying water if needed. The film is actually very funny and had me laughing consistently, Shore stays away from being too annoying. Andy Dick is just as funny as he is on NewsRadio. Petty and Grier are also funny. I recommend this for Shore fans and those who want a good impression of him.

While Son in Law is Pauly Shore's best movie, this is proves to be my personal favorite among his body of work. The premise of Shore being in the army is about hilarious as Leonardo DiCaprio demanding $25 million and getting it! Plenty of laughs either way. Anyway, this film was rather funny and sarcastic, satirizing the military and the macho attitudes which seem to be quite prevalent. While the cast (Shore, David Alan Grier, Andy Dick and Lori Petty) isn't going to impress you with their firm grasp of the thespian arts, it still was good stuff to watch. Also, Esai Morales and Art LaFleur both

provided solid supporting roles.

This whole movie was trying to look like the 90s version of the 1981 comedy classic "Stripes" starring Bill Murray and Harold Ramis. the story is so silly and stupid, the character are unpredictable and even the jokes are so lame despite being Pauly's Shore last film as a surfer until Bio-dome 2 years later since he had to get his head shave for the scene of the head shaving in this movie and even the budget went; there's even a few cameos in this film including Brendan Fraser as Link who also appeared with Pauly Shore in "Encino Mean" and "Son in Law" and yet the last film that Pauly Shore did as part of a three-film contract with Hollywood Pictures, so instead check out "Stripes" which is even better in my book.