The Jerk, Too

Okay The Jerk is one of my all time favorite movies. I will even go as far to say that it is a standard for comedies. When I was watching cable a couple months ago I saw this pile of crud and I disturbed by every single second of it. First I laughed at how bad it was, then I was compelled by the fact that it could not get worse, but it did.

I Should have known though look at the cast. First you have Stacy Nelkin who stared in the most insulting chapter of the Halloween series (part 3), and you have Mark Blankfield in the title role. Now he was okay in Robin Hood men in tights, but come on the guy was in Angel 3.

Do yourself a favor and never put yourself through the pain of seeing this... well I was almost going to call it film but that would be an insult to every other movie ever created. Just don't watch this.

I can't believe this movie exists.

Me and my friends ran into it on TV and watched the whole thing.

This movie really does address problems of the first "Jerk". For example, the first Jerk didn't have enough silly crosseyed faces. Thankfully "the Jerk Too" makes up for this in plentiful amounts. Also the original "Jerk" had too many jokes. Luckily, "the Jerk Too" knows when to draw the line. The jokes fly by at about one every 20 minutes, whew, just enough time to catch your breath in between laughing so hard! At the crosseyed faces!

Why is this movie so dark? I don't mean grim or gothic. I mean they seemed to only have key lights and left out the fill lights. Every scene has pitch black backgrounds, where you can only see the actors in the foreground. Ever notice how movies with a lot of pitch black makes you want to go to sleep? Or at their best, make you feel like they are hiding something, something mysterious or scary. This is how the Jerk makes you feel -- sleepy and afraid.

The music is bizarre. The first half of the movie is a horrible 70s comedy soundtrack...wacky light hearted music that comes and goes whenever it feels like it. It usually covers up the long montages of city scapes that take up a lot of time in script-deprived films like this. BUT THEN the music starts turning more into an 80s sound...pumping bass and fake heavily reverbed drums. Very odd.

The most fascinating scene was the classic Hobos vs. Bum dramatic monologue towards the end of the movie. Sure, there aren't ANY jokes in this very long scene, SURE, it doesn't help further the plot, it has nothing to do with the main character, and it brings up issues that were otherwise completely absent from the rest of the film. But on it's own, without the context of the bad movie, it's a pretty interesting scenario. I just can't figure out what it's doing in this movie.

Basically when a bunch of hobos are together and planning a way to rescue the jerk, one hobo declares opposition to the plan. "Why should I help him, nobody helps us!" The lead hobo then goes on a VERY lengthy speech about the difference between a hobo and a bum. It is VERY repetitive and adds NOTHING NOTHING NOOOOOTHING to the film. IT'S SO WEIRD.

So to sum up : No jokes, no lights, a lot of "Hobo #3" character development in one scene.

I'm going to spend as much time on this review as the writers did on the script. This is easily THE WORST sequel EVER made.

They KILLED Navin Johnson. Not only was Mark Blankfield's performance GOD-AWFUL, so was everyone elses!! The physical comedy was forced, flat and predictable. The script seemed to have been written by mongoloid monkeys using the pen names Ziggy Steinberg and Rocco Urbisci. How the producers managed to squeeze out such vile cinematic excrement is beyond me. They even managed to make veteran actor Ray Walston look like a talent-less buffoon. Director Michael Schultz should be ashamed of himself.

I want the 96 minutes of my life I spent watching this befouled memory of a brilliant comedy back so I can try and convict everyone involved for this cinematic atrocity.

Never in my life have I ever seen such a pile of garbage!

How can you take a classic and try and make a TV sequel out of it? I only saw half of this movie (I'm still trying to watch it, though it's painful....very painful) and I haven't even attempted to laugh once. It's on par with Short Circuit 2 and Weekend at Bernies 2 as worst attempt at a sequel ever.

We appear to be following the adventures of Nathan Johnson, played by Steve Martin in the original. In this one, they found a very unfunny guy named Mark Blankfield to play the part. The guy is as funny as a cardboard box. I've seen him since and there's no question to why he's never made it bigger, though there is the question of how he made it in the first place, if you can call this making it. He's out to impress Marie's family, who are suddenly well to do themselves. How Marie went from Bernadette Peters to this chick, I don't know. All he does is try to give stupid looks, but they just come across like he's constipated. He keeps telling Marie that he's Navin Johnson over and over, like it's funny he can't recall she already know him. The people look like their counterparts as much as George Clooney looks like George Plimpton.

Hijinks ensue. Nothing is funny, though. It's almost like they decided to make it a drama with some slap stick action tossed in, but I somehow know they're trying to be funny, which is just a horrible feeling. Somehow Ray Walston was suckered into this film (perhaps he had a debt to pay or a house to re-finance, who knows) along with Jimmie Walker, who was probably just thankful for the work.

I just want to know who the guy was that sold his soul to get this 'movie' done. It's truly horrible.The acting is on par with porno.The charm of the first film is completely lost on this miserable hunk o'junk. If they had named it something else, I don't think anyone would have ever thought it had a connection, I mean none at all. There's only one grade to give this movie, and that's the 9th level of Hell. May God have mercy on they're souls. Amen.

The Jerk Too is a great family film with Innocent laughter about the simple things in life. It's about a very naive fully grown man with the mentality of a seven year old. Navin Johnson is the man that does not know what is going on, which direction to take, how to get there or how long it will take, but he has already started walking.

The humor in this character is something that everyone can relate to. Everyone at some point in their life has felt the exact same way as Navin only everyone else was at least a decade and a half younger.

Those of you who were disappointed in this film, please keep in mind that it was written by the exact same people who wrote the first film. It was not a flop, a stolen idea, or any kind of spin off, they just wanted to do it differently. And they chose to do it differently.

Also keep in mind that it is not a sequel to the first movie. You can not watch both movies and see a common ground between the two main characters. Completely different characters, completely different plots, completely different movie altogether.