Big Trouble

Its been a while since a movie has made me laugh out loud... at home... on DVD without the help of a theater audience to provide a helpful laugh track... but this Dave Barry adaptation did it. The wildly slapstick script keeps its wildly varied cast hopping... and hopping admirably! Tim Allen, Rene Russo, Zooey Deschanel, Ben Foster, Stanley Tucci, Janeane Garafalo, Dennis Farina... heck, the entire ensemble is so good that I would gladly sign on for a sequel... hey Mr. Sonnenfeld, welcome back to funny!

I consider myself an intelligent person, a lover of movies, and having seen this movie twice now, I still think it's great. "Laugh-out-loud-embarrassing-the-person-sitting-next-to-you" great. The film was perfectly cast, perfectly paced, just bizarre enough to keep one's attention, and loaded with funny, crazy scenes. I haven't met a person in the flesh who hated this film, and yet the critics and several folks here have trashed the heck out of it. Frankly, it would seem that America has lost its sense of humor.

I still remember laughing so hard I was in tears in a theater filled with less than 20 people! A great cast and well written, this movie got the shaft after it was suddenly moved to a 12/2001 release (with almost no publicity)after the events of 9/11 because the movie had scenes depicting lax airport security. We Americans were far to fragile to see someone smuggling an atomic bomb and a gun through poor security! What people missed was a funny story and some of the best one-liners I have ever heard ("maybe you guys should plead Not Guilty by reason of stupidity!). Honestly, I have never been able to drive into an airport without thinking about Arriving and Departing ("We're arriving, but then we are departing?")and Florida Gator fans just get hammered! Great flick, get the DVD and see it for real, not the Comedy Central version.

Big Trouble is most assuredly one of the funniest movies ever produced, written and directed. An all-star cast, in my opinion. Tim Allen, Rene Russo, Ben Foster, Dennis Farina, Stanley Tucci, Janeane Garrafolo, and Tom Sizemore all star in this laugh out loud comedy about how a (seemingly) easy hit-job goes terribly awry. This movie is so funny and the subject matter is so easy to follow, however, very difficult to write about, because without giving the movie away as far as what the plot is and how it ends, you can't really tell what it's about. But, Allen and Tucci are funnier than ever. Tucci is one of the best character actors, you always believe he is who he's playing, and Allen is just always good at delivering those quick-witted lines. Ben and Zooey are also very good in their apathetic performances and the kid from "The New Guy" and "Road Trip" is also funny in the few scenes which he is in. I really dislike Dennis Farina and Rene Russo in most films, but in this they both are extremely likeable and make me forget how bad they are usually. It's not so much that they're normally bad, but they always have the same performance in every role that they play. However, these two roles that they play suite their personalities better. Jason Lee was also one of the stars, who is always good in everything that he does, even in the worst movie ever made, 'Vanilla Sky', he was extremely good. At the beginning of the movie he's sitting in front of the camera talking and it makes him appear as though he is Jesus. But, it's not as sacreligeous as it may sound. The lines that are delivered by everyone are hilarious and fast. That was the other thing about this movie that was really well done. The fastness of the speech. The director was really smart in having everyone deliver their lines as quickly as they could, I've seen this done in a couple of other movies, the most specific one that comes to mind is 'Brain Donors'. Some of the movie is realistic, for example the scene in which Farina is eating in a restaurant. If you've seen the movie, you'll know what I'm talking about. I enjoyed this movie a great deal, and I've seen it twice now. I hope everyone watches it, because they don't make movies this funny anymore, and they really should. Cynical, and dry were two words that come to mind. I hope you check it out because it's a definite 10 out of 10. See ya at the movies!

It's Easter, and as my parents sit in the living room watching television with the volume turned up to 86, here I sit in my bedroom, typing a review for the movie we just saw, "Big Trouble." It was my father's choice, a choice I assume he quickly began to lament, as the movie almost immediately begins with a scene of a man sucking the toes of his incredibly attractive maid. I mean, if you thought watching sex scenes with your parents was awkward, just try watching foot fetishism.

"Big Trouble" is one of my dad's favorite comedies, and honestly, I can understand why. It's a breezy, quickly paced, and fast moving little flick that's charmingly irreverent and definitely unpredictable. With a surprisingly star-studded cast and everything from bumbling hitmen to a street full of goats to Johnny Knoxville trying to rob a bar, "Big Trouble" has enough characters and plot points to fill the first two seasons of a CBS television show. And somehow, the movie makes it work, most likely because of the overall bizarness of the story.

Ben Foster, Tim Allen, Zoey Deschanel, and Rene Russo all have parts to play in this film, including a laundry list of other stars too numerous to mention. And part of the fun of watching this movie was seeing who was going to show up next. All of them have their own role in this movie, and all of them get into scenarios so unrealistic, bordering on cartoonish, that at times this movie felt like a live-action Looney Tunes epsiode. But, and I hate to say this, it adds to the films charm. I mean, this movie is so out there that I guarantee you've never seen anything like it. It's a very weird, almost surreal movie, but it's fun.

The overall bizarness of this story made it enjoyable for me to watch, and the one liners and running gags sprinkled throughout made me laugh harder than I expected. I'm not as big of a fan of this movie as my dad is, but it had more than enough wackiness to keep me entertained throughout.

7/10