Il mio amico scongelato

Excellent light hearted comedy with Brendan Fraser giving an excellent performance and well supported by Pauly Shore. Brendan seems to handle these caveman type roles well, see George of the Jungle, Monkeybones. Good family fun.

When they find a frozen caveman (Brendan Fraser) in their back yard, two high school outcasts thaw him and introduce him to modern life while he in turn gets them to actually enjoy life.

Pauly Shore made some okay movies and some bad movies. This one, along with "Bio-Dome", is an okay movie, or maybe even good. Then it starts going downhill from "Son-in-Law" to "Jury Duty" and we try to forget everything else. Shore was sort of a one-note joke, and because he was not able to grow beyond that, he kind of faded away.

This film works well because Fraser captures the caveman thing really well, but even more so it is Sean Astin who saves the day. By playing the straight man, he keeps the Fraser-Shore antics grounded, and his role should not be understated.

*about a Cro-Magnon man attending high school.

*featuring Sean Astin as a non-hobbit.

*that's got Pauly Shore in it.

I just saw this movie again after many, many hundreds of years, and bugger me if it hasn't IMPROVED with age! (er, by that I mean it HAS...)

I was a bit like the Sean Astin character when I was at school. If only I'd had a caveman of my own to help me pull chicks, how differently things might have turned out...

Okay, so the movie has no basis in reality, but who would expect it to? Cavemen aside, it's a TEEN movie, and they NEVER depict real people or situations. At least, not on any planet I've ever been to.

This movie doesn't pretend to be anything outstanding. It's intended purely as entertainment, and that's what it is.

It appears to have been promoted as one of those frightful "Pauly Shore movies", but it's not. He's really just a supporting player (and is nowhere near as annoying in small doses, it turns out). This is Brendan Fraser's flick. If anyone else had played Link, I can't imagine the movie being as good as it is.

My one beef is that Sandra Hess ("Cave Nug") wasn't given enough screen time (but then, as far as I'm concerned, she's NEVER given enough screen time).

I never knew Scatterbrain had covered "Mama Said Knock You Out", either. That's cool.

Okay, I'm going for a lie down now.

Bye.

I expected the usual stoner-gross-out-high-school-comedy and had also heard that Pauly Shore was a comedic one-trick-pony (I'd read about all those Razzies he had been awarded). Also, the premise of high-school kids finding a thawed-up "cro-magnon" man and becoming friends with him didn't bide well, so I kind of watched this out of completism and deep-rooted cinematic masochism. Turns out I was way off the mark. "Encino Man" is thoroughly enjoyable, and one of the best movies of its genre. And Pauly Shore is my god now, he really made this movie. Well, he may be a one-trick-comedian, but at least at he's the godfather of this one trick. The stoner-surfer-dude has been done ad nauseam in high-school comedies, but Pauly Shore is the stoner-surfer-dude to rule all other stoner-surfer-dudes. His figure is not just funny and dude-ish, but also eccentric and frail (almost a bit camp). When I read that he comes from a family of comedians, I wasn't surprised. I see a lot of comedic and dramatic talent in him, and it's a shame that he seems to have fallen out of favour recently.

Anyway, the movie. Luckily, the pretty goofy plot doesn't put it in harm's way. Two likable social dropouts find a stone age survivor in their back yard, and decide to smuggle him into their school in order to heighten their own peer standing. This goes terribly awry when the hunky pre-human becomes a hit with the ladies. Man seems to be set in atavistic struggle against pre-human (and stoner dude), but luckily they eventually find their moral bearings: the humans learn the benefits of sticking together from their thawed-out friend, and the cro-magnon learns to go "halfies" on his microwave burrito.

Like I said, I really enjoyed Pauly Shore here. He made this movie. The other actors are also good, there's great dialogue, and the babes are babe-alicious. I also enjoyed the fact that the underdogs were the protagonists here.

To give you a ballpark comparison, it's au pair with Ferris Bueller's Day Off. Yes, it's that good, buuuh-dy.

I'm not sure why, but still to this day I love to sit down to Encino Man. I think because I just loved it as a child and it's like that blankie you can't get rid off. Also, you need those comedies that you can just sit down too and just have fun and relax. Yes, it has Pauly Shore which granted can be scare-E! :D But he's actually amusing as well in the film.

We see a very young Brendon Fraser as Link the caveman, yes, he doesn't have much to work with the grunting and such. But he was just priceless in that club scene and the seven eleven with Pauly. He's also just so cute and lovable when he sees Dave and Stoney getting into a fight and he pulls David back screaming to him "Family!". It was actually touching, I'm serious. Sean Austin plays Dave, he's come such a long way and in my opinion is the most successful child star to not get hooked on drugs or let the industry take him over. He does such a good job as the pretty self centered and insecure but nevertheless lovable guy who wants to get the girl. Pauly plays Stoney, a well, I think he's somewhat of a stoner. :D But he's pretty funny in the film with some of his lines. Come on, I think we all dug him in his day.

While yes, Encino Man is not Oscar material, it's just a fun time to sit down and enjoy with your friends. So, a 5.0? It's just a movie, let go and grab the popcorn for a few laughs. If you didn't laugh at that scene where Link speaks Spanish to the Hispanic gang members, you have some serious issues.

7/10