User reviews

One of the worst movies I've ever seen..kept flipping back and forth to another show. I watched it because I love Fran Drescher. I thought she was funny as 'let me feel you badge Velma' and Rosie O'Donnell was okay..but David Johanson was soooooo annoying with his voice. John C McGuinley cracks me up on Scrubs but not in this movie. Horrible horrible horrible. A rated R movie that ends with a mob guy yelling 'I want my mommy' is just the worst of the worst because thats a clichéd line from most PG movies. It provides no laughs for adults. Fran Drescher mustve done this before The Nanny got on the air because TN debuted the year before and anyone with their own sitcom wouldn't offer to do this piece of garbage. Anyone who glances at the script can tell its a bad movie..no one could've thought it would be a hit.

This movie is not as bad as you may have heard. It is even worse. I actually saw this movie about 3 years ago, and I am just now getting around to reviewing it because it took me that long to wrap my brain around how insipid this film actually is. Only the presence of Jeremy Piven saves this from being 100% garbage. I think Jeremy was drunk and/or injected with horse tranquilizers for all his scenes; I would have to be intoxicated to appear in this movie, too. Without Mr. Piven to dilute the pain, I believe my VCR would have spontaneously combusted from bad movie overload. He is, however, only a tiny oasis of talent in the vast wasteland of crap that is known as "Car 54". Avoid, like you would small pox, plutonium or any other weapon of mass destruction.

I have no clue why I watched this piece of crap when I was little, but now as an adult there's no fun. It's too painful to watch. There's a theory that certain TV shows that turn into the big screens work out while some just fall right down the crapper. "Car 54, Where are You?" is one of those movies.

Plot: Gunther Toody takes in a new partner, the uptight Muldoon, while protecting local idiot Herbert Hortz.

There's too many performers to list who are a waste of talent from David Johansen (no relation to Scarlett), John C. McGinley (TV's "Scrubs"), Fran Drescher ("The Nanny"), Daniel Baldwin (Vampires), Jeremy Piven ("Entourage", Black Hawk Down), Nipsey Russell, Rosie O'Donnell, Al Lewis ("The Munsters") and more.

Oh, the humanity.

I rented this movie as part of a local video stores "five films for five nights" deal and I needed a fifth film to get the deal. It took me five nights to watch it because I could literally only stand fifteen minutes of it at a time. I tortured myself on the last night and endured eighteen minutes of it. I truly admire anyone who was able to sit through this in a theater without leaving.

I've sat through some dreadful films in my time, but this one may well be the all-time winner. I watched the whole thing with my mouth hanging open in stunned disbelief that it could be as bad as it was.

I was extremely interested in seeing the film around the time it came out. This was back when Nick@Nite was showing reruns of the old Car 54 TV show, and I was one of the many who was first exposed to it there and fell in love with it. My understanding was that it was this renaissance of cult interest in the show that motivated the making of a movie. So I was looking forward to seeing said movie.

The thing about this movie was, it seemed extremely evident that NOBODY associated with the making of this movie HAD EVER actually *seen* the original TV show upon which it is (supposedly) based. That the main characters are named Toody and Mulldoon seems almost a coincidence; they aren't even *remotely* like the original characters, except in so far as being cops. The original Car 54 TV show had a delightful, wacky sense of humor. This abomination of a film has NO sense of humor. I didn't not laugh once, not one single time. The original TV show had an amusing, catchy theme song. This thing had some monstrosity of a rap. What I will never, ever fathom is how *anybody* ever signed off on this thing at any stage in its development. I want to know who looked at the script for this and say "Yeah! That's great!" and what drugs they were on.

I remain in everlasting awe that they were able to propose, write, film, edit, and release a Car 54 film that had absolutely NOTHING to do with the great old TV show, Car 54, Where Are You. When you factor in the disappointment factor over what it could have been, I think this could well be the worst ever. There was just *no good reason* for it to have been this bad.

Everyone grows up with some cherished memories. One of mine was the T.V. series "Car 54, Where Are You?". It had a simple charm and the main characters Toody (Joe E. Ross) and Muldoon (Fred Gwynne) were gentle and the humour was good clean fun. Although they would mess things up at the beginning of each episode they would somehow get everything alright in the end without anyone getting into harm. Fred Gwynne's character (Muldoon) evoked sympathy and love from his viewers - especially children. With this in mind I got out the video of the movie remake of this series. What an absolute disgrace of a movie it turned out to be! The makers of this movie completely turned around the series two morally decent characters and made them into immoral fools. The key point of the T.V. series was that Muldoon was an innocent, naive policeman who did his job with a genuine love for those he served. The Muldoon in this movie remake is a repulsive character. The clean fun is also out in this remake. No wonder that this movie is listed by IMDb in its worst 100 movies of all time. It deserves it! The makers of this movie lost its main market (the nostalgics) by ignoring the behaviour standards of the original series. Not recommended!

Having grown up watching the TV show on which this is supposed to be based on, I cannot imagine how anyone could come up with a plot like this one. The original had two good actors with good story writing. This movie seems to have been written by someone who has never written anything beyond his 3rd grade 'what I did on my summer vacation' assignment, who is on drugs, and who was forced to write a screenplay or his bookie would break his legs.

When the film began, two things struck me. First, how incredibly cheesy and stupid the first two minutes were. Second, I happened to be watching the film with my laptop and I noticed on the IMDb site that the film was made in 1990 but not released for 4 years--a sure sign that the film was a crap-fest! Holding a film for release (with one exception) is a kiss of death for a film. The only exception was "Arsenic and Old Lace" which was held for release until the original play ended its run on Broadway--and was a wonderful film.

So why, in the first place, would they want to remake "Car 54"? It's obviously impossible to capture the old show as the two leads (Fred Gwynne and Joe E. Ross) were dead and the show bears almost no similarity to Nat Hiken's silly (and low-brow) but well-written show. Well, it was done for one reason and one reason alone--Hollywood has been bereft of story ideas and has chosen to simply recycle old TV shows as movies instead of actually hiring writers who are not morons (or chimps). What else could explain the plethora of 3rd rate remakes or 2nd and 3rd rate TV shows?! As Joe E. Ross was a one-note performer with possible simian genes, the producers of this film decided to find another actor(?) who bore a striking similarity to Cornelius of "The Planet of the Apes" fame, David Johansen. Sadly he DID sound and talk like Ross' character--but 30 years later, it just seemed annoying. As far as Fred Gwynne goes, John C. McGinley bore no similarity whatsoever to the original character and was in many ways more like Tackleberry from "Police Academy"--as he was violent and prone to shooting first.

So despite my reservations about the acting, the four year delay and the horrible introduction, is there a plot which makes the film worth seeing? Well, considering that the film is currently ranked #59 on IMDb's Bottom 100 (the 100 films with the lowest overall score), it's unlikely that I'll be recommending it any time soon (unless I loose my mind, though my kids would re-word this to "further loose my mind"--as watching this film would suggest). With such wonderfully funny things like Johansen accidentally rip out an old man's catheter (uggh), spit jokes (complete with lots of spit) and McGinley giving blind guy's tickets for stepping into the street, the film is indeed quite awful...and mind-numbingly stupid. In fact, after watching this film I actually feel significantly stupider! Do yourself a favor--don't watch this film. Even bad movie fans (like myself) won't enjoy this one...unless they are masochists.

A lot of reviewers talk about how terrible this movie is and yet they do not go into any details about why it is so bad. The only possible explanation is that they found the humor to be too obnoxious and/ or silly. But that is the whole point of the film. It is very lowbrow- crude and outrageous with a lot of sexual inuendo. There are no technical flaws. The pace is always brisk and all the actors put in good performances. Rosie O'Donnel is totally hilarious and David Johansen lends some surprising sensitivity and depth to his portrayal. The one part of the movie I personally found cringe worthy were the musical numbers. They were painfully, embarrassingly bad , but again, that was presumably the point. Not only is this movie worth seeing , it is worth seeing again.

Sight gags galore, rapid fire jokes and ridiculous situations. It has an almost all star comedy cast, with many old favorites. Sure its formulaic, juvenile, and a little cheesy, but so was the original. I have read many of the reviews written by those who were unable to turn their brains off and just enjoy. I would just like to say lighten up. It can't all be Shakespeare. Who would want that anyway? So here it is pure fun without graphic violence, dozens of cuss words, nudity, or heavy sexual situations. In other words, something good to watch with the kids. I won't call it a completely child safe movie, but it is close.

For the time I wasted. This is the only movie I have ever walked out of a theater on. I've been compelled to sit through terrible movies simply out of curiosity, i.e. could it get any worse? But I walked out of Car 54 for fear that it WOULD get worse. I'm glad my brother worked at a movie theater at the time. I didn't have to pay for the time I wasted.

My mission as of late has been to watch every single film on the list of 100 worst movies ever made. Right now I have scratched off around 20, with this steaming pile of rotting filth being one of them. Make no mistake, Car 54 is one of the single worst movies to come out of Hollywood, or as I like to call it, Evil Town (creative name, no?). I violently protest any of the other posters who claimed that some parts of this movie were either "average" or (shudder) "funnny." Nothing in this movie works, from start to finish, and to save the sanity of others I will try and express who bad things get. The opening scene features a truly horrible song and dance number which is badly filmed with a soft glow technique and features a cartoon canary that at one point dresses up like a rapper (oh yeah, no racial stereotypes here, no sir). Then we discover that this was the dream of our main character, a goofy cop played by the single most irritating man on the planet. Seriously, his voice and silly putty face made me want to shoot someone when he started talking. We then get the opening credits as a crappy rap song is played, one where a single verse is repeated 3 TIMES. God, was that excruciating, considering that during this song I got supposedly "wacky" footage of the cops acting silly. The rest of the movie is populated with characters NO ONE could love, a barely existing plot that has no chance of being stretched over 90 minutes, and who knows what else. Honestly I couldn't stomach much of this trash, since most of the humor is either obvious or downright nasty. Obvious example: the policemen keep going to donut stores when they're supposed to be working. OH, HAR HAR HAR. Is that supposed to be funny in 1994, much less 2003? Plus the fact that the entire thing is horribly outdated by its fashion, soundtrack, and slang. This was back when rappers wearing giant clock necklaces was considered "hip," so you can imagine the amount of bad fashion choices spattered throughout this film. Rosie O' Donnel makes her film debut here, and she crashes and burns I'm happy to say. Nasty example: the main character actually has sex with Rosie O' Donnel while screaming, "Oooh! OOOOH! OOOOOOOH!" You can't know it by reading that, but he says it in a "comical" way. Trust me, it's just plain nauseating. AVOID CAR 54, WHERE ARE YOU IF YOU VALUE THE PURITY OF YOUR SOUL. 0/4 stars

Car 54 is easily the worst big-screen adaptation of a classic television show and will likely hold that distinction for ever. Car 54, Where are You? is simply the worst comedy of all-time and one of the worst movies ever made. It may very well be the worst movie ever made because it is so unfunny and the cast including the disgusting and unfunny pairing of Buster Pointdexter(in the lead role!) and Rosie O'Donnell as his wife. They are absolutely awful, unfunny, and nauseating. The movie wastes a fine supporting cast that includes Jeremy Piven, John C. McGinley, Nipsey Russell, and Fran Drescher. Al Lewis a star of the original 1950's series reprises his role, this time as cop in his 80's! Yes his eighties. The movie was made in 1991 and sat on the shelf for a few years. It should have been locked away or burned. This movie is worst than any Police Academy movie. It is right up there with Manos, Garbage Pale Kids, and From Justin to Kelly as the worst movie ever made. 1 out 10. Beyond Awful.

I dont think so.The cast are so bad in this and its not suprising the script is worse than a Police academy Sequal.the main stars have no screen chemistry.its just so unfunny.infact its dead boring considering this was based on a classic comedy show its amazing how bad this is.its in the bottom 100 imdb movies and for very good reason.1 out of 10

What could be more annoying than David Johansen and Fran Dresher's voices combined?

The movie isn't really that funny, except for the part where they throw Rossy in the garbage (joke)! It's not that bad, if you don't have anything else to do and can stand Fran Dresher's voice. Don't rent this one though, wait 'till some TV station decides to fill an empty timespot from 2 to 4 am!!!

Yet another example of Hollywood that has run out of ideas and wants to milk a classic with a remake that is a disaster. They never learn to leave the classics alone

I saw this movie on television years ago and the movie was so bad, I didn't even finish the movie. I couldn't tell you what the entire movie was about. The entire plot was just a sloppy mess and you can't even follow where it was going. For a comedy it was very unfunny. I know it was based on an old TV show which was way before my time but surely it was funny back then?!

The cast which includes John C. McGinley (Platoon, The Rock, Scrubs), Fran Drescher (The Nanny), Jeremy Piven (Entourage, Black Hawk Down), and Daniel Baldwin (Vampires) must have been VERY desperate for work to appear in this really bad movie. The lead actor David Johansen seems to have disappeared off the radar altogether. Perhaps this is movie that all the cast members involved would rather forget.

It's no surprise that this stinker of a movie is still on the IMDb's Bottom 100.

Do yourself a favour and avoid this movie at all costs.

1/10.

Hey, folks, here's a news flash for ya' : This is a comedy.

I can't understand how the same people who give "Ace Ventura " and "Dumb &

dumberer" high marks turn around and pan this movie. The former two are far, far more insulting to both my intelligence and my aesthetic sensibilities.

Well, whatever. I enjoy this movie everytime it comes around on cable. Lots of great scenes with reasonably intelligent jokes (considering the genre.) I think Johansen is perfect in his role, as is Rosie.

So there.

In the 1990s-2000s there was an annoying trend in Hollywood to make unnecessary and almost always awful movies based on old TV shows that had lots of fans. Movies like 2005's THE HONEYMOONERS and 1998's THE AVENGERS quickly come to mind, but very few today remember a bad TV show adaptation that had the singular distinction of being in the old Bottom 100: 1994's CAR 54 WHERE ARE YOU?. It was also made in 1991 but not released until three years later - a clear sign that the movie was a snot-fest.

Why this movie is so bad? The main reason is that it was impossible capture the humour the 1960s show had. Mostly because the two leads of the original show were already dead and the movie has nothing to do with Nat Hiken's clever and witty show. Fred Gwynne and Joe E. Ross are replaced by John C. McGinley and David Johansen respectively. Johansen sounded pretty much like Joe E. Ross, with the only difference that his voice is so annoying and grating on the nerves that I wanted to put my hand on his mouth for shutting him up. As for Fred Gwynne, McGinley was nothing like him and he looked more very cocky and ready to shoot at first sight!

So, what are the other problems of the movie? The beginning is very pointless, with Johansen that has dreams with various music tunes: the acting is awful by practically everyone (not only by Johansen, but also by Daniel Baldwin, Rosie O'Donnell in one of her first movies, and Nipsey Russell). Considering that the movie was also in the old Bottom 100, it's clear that I would never recommend it to anyone. The humour is probably the worst, with lots of spit jokes, a shootout at the funfair, Johansen ripping off Al Lewis' catheter, cops seating in the worst chairs ever made (obviously falling on the ground), and many other awful moments that I fortunately blocked out of my mind, they were too much to bear. This movie is quite awful, capable of making the viewer sick and a chore to watch until the end.

That's right, a Comic Genius created "Car 54, Where Are You?" His name was Nat Hiken and he created the BRILLIANTLY FUNNY TV series. It deeply saddens me that this film was ever made as it serves only to detract from how incredibly wonderful the original TV show was. That said, PLEASE don't judge the TV show by this moronic movie. If you have a chance to see the show, do so! DON'T think to yourself "Well if the film was that bad, then the TV series must be even worse!" Quite the contrary. The TV version is one of the funniest half hours of entertainment ever created. Every episode is a comic gem. Every character is terrifically hilarious and memorable. So in closing, I'll simply urge you yo go out and hunt down VHS copies and hold a marathon with all of your closest friends. The original "Car 54, Where Are You?" deserves to be discovered by a new generation of fans. Enjoy! You won't be disappointed.

I've had this movie for a while but never bothered to watch it. But when I stumbled across this movie as one of the worst on the IMDb bottom list I just had to see if this movie was really bad. I had hoped it wouldn't be too bad but I gave it a try. After the first 30 minutes I was shocked. This movie is awful. Not even Grandpa Munster or Fran from "The Nanny" TV show could save this movie. In fact the only thing I found funny was Penn and Teller in one scene. All of the jokes in Car 54 were either not funny or recycled from dozens of other movies like the Police Academy series. Everybody is at their worst in this movie. David Johansen is pulling off this annoying voice for his character and John C. McGinley plays a very shallow by the rules cop who lives with his mother. David Johansen was much better as the evil Thantos in the nanny movie with Hulk Hogan and John C. McGinley was better in Highlander 2. This movie is just a sorry excuse for a comedy and it also has some of the most annoying songs you'll ever hear in a movie!!!