MXP: Mon extrême primate

Disclaimer: I have no particular interest in chimps. My name is a reference to the subject line on the first email I ever sent and has nothing to do with how I feel about watching primates on screen.

Julie considers skateboarding celebrity Jack and her other three chimps to be like family. And when Jack is depressed, she believes a trip to Mexico will cheer him up.

At the airport, Julie learns the chimps will not be able to sit together, but she doesn't mind. Jack is off reading a magazine when a group of children in beautiful costumes, apparently representing different countries, passes by. The child wearing a sombrero and serape like Jack's has to use the restroom badly, but the woman in charge of the kids can't be bothered. The kid goes anyway, and when Jack joins the group, no one notices the kid is missing.

Julie eventually discovers Jack is not on her plane. There is nothing she can do once the plane lands, because a hurricane is coming.

In Mt. Blackbrush, Colorado, 12-year-old Pete is having trouble adjusting after he and his older brother Jay have moved with their father from Oregon--and if that's not enough, the boys' father has to leave for several days. Pete is a talented snowboarder and Jay belongs to a rock band.

When the boys say goodbye to their father at the Denver airport, the colorfully dressed children--and Jack--arrive at the same time. Jack hitches a ride in a van which happens to be headed to the Mexican restaurant where the boys will be eating.

Jack happens to be there when bumbling crooks Gilfred and Stanley get kicked out of a limo for botching a robbery.

Pete joins a snowboarding group but he's still treated like the "new kid". A competition is coming up, and the winner gets to meet Bjorn Leines. But Pete has no partner.

Jack and Pete finally meet and go to the store where Shirley works--where Gilfred and Stanley are hiding behind magazines as they prepare to rob the place. But Jack is on the cover of one of the magazines. That's him! Wait, new plan!

If you're as smart as Stanley (or is it Gilfred), you can figure it out from here. (If you're no smarter than the other one, you shouldn't watch any movie more challenging than this.) Hint: I saw "Air Bud: Golden Receiver" several weeks ago and immediately recognized it as the movie Jack was watching. No, I don't know whether the chimp from that movie also played Jack.

The chimps here are talented; the humans are not. Actually, the snowboarders show a lot of talent, but since we don't see their faces I'm guessing they are stunt players. Not only are they very good, but so is the filming of their action.

The chimp or chimps playing Jack is/are amazing. Of course, we are likely seeing the results of a considerable amount of training and rewards for performance. But the character Jack shows outstanding intelligence.

As for human actors with lines, I suppose Devin Douglas Drewitz and Trevor Wright are at least good enough not to be bad. Another performance worth seeing came from James Crescenzo as the boss who torments Gilfred and Stanley--who are funny characters even if the actors aren't especially good.

One gag with the two bumbling idiots and a large snowball worked really well. It would be easy in a cartoon, but too dangerous for actual people. But with creative design and editing, it's great.

This is really a movie for kids. There is no offensive content, and most of the music is really loud rock not intended for anyone over 25. If it wasn't edited for TV, this deserves a G rating.

But I'm no kid, and I enjoyed this a lot.

In Britain, there is a drink called PG Tips. It's a kind of tea. It's quite nice. I personally enjoy it with a splash of milk and two generous spoonfuls of sugar. During the 90's it was the biggest selling tea in Britain, even outselling the tea conglomerate Typhoo. The reason for this was a clever marketing campaign featuring even cleverer monkeys who read the newspaper and erm, drink tea and stuff. During the 70's, the chimps were taken off the air only to be brought back 18 months later with PG tips facing rapidly declining sales. See? Chimps can do good stuff. In the name of moderniazation and er, animal rights (what's that?), the chimps have again been taken off the air and replaced with claymation bird models. However, clever Hollywood types sat up and took notice. People like monkeys. They look like people! But funnier! Ha Ha! Funny-like-people-monkeys!!!!!! Forcibly and hungrily breast-feeding itself on the PG tips monkey's success comes MXP, where chimps do all the things they were born to do: snowboarding, shaving, cooking and faithfully re-enacting the plots of all the Home Alone movies. This is not a film not to watch because you don't like monkeys. This is not a film not to watch because you are a card carrying member of PETA. This is a film not to watch because you will gnaw your own arm off and wish you were dead. No animals were harmed during the filming. Let us hope the same can not be said of the actors, producer, director and all involved in this sad, sad movie made for (and by) people who like gnawing their arm off and wishing they were dead.

Upon first viewing I was surprised by the depth of character the talented monkey-cast presented in MXP3. The simian thespians are present in every scene, emotionally and physically, and impressively match and in some cases surpass the emotional depth of the leading boy of the film, Devin Douglas Drewitz. Young Trip-D, as he likes to be called on set, provides the movie with an obstinately melancholy performance, tantalizing the monkeys' emotional receptors like so many ripe bananas. Trip-D's angst and sorrow, expertly captured by cinematographer Mike Southon, is as palpable and inspirational as his name is alliterative. Sadly, before my much anticipated second viewing, I learned that the primate performers playing the lead role of Jack, as well as his off-set monkey girlfriend playing Lucy (quite the looker if you ask me) are active scientologists. Furthermore, these two donated the majority of their paychecks toward dianetic research. Had I been privy to this information prior to my first viewing, I never, NEVER would have spent 75 dollars on the collectors edition DVD and silver-plated palm frond from the much talked about Mexican restaurant scene.

It's no wonder they added the "X" in the title of this sequel to MVP and MVP 2. It has the best monkey shower scene I've ever seen. This monkey nudity only served to make the primate more "human" so I can understand it's inclusion in the film. With out it, it would have been merely a typical animal sports movie in the tradition of Air Bud.

I haven't seen monkeys and humans bond this well, since "Gorillas in the Mist". Not only does the monkey take a shower, but he also brushes his teeth, shave with a razor, plays the drums, plays video games, drinks a frozen drink and gets brain freeze, and oh yeah he snowboards too. What will Jack do next? I for one can't wait. Opposable thumbs way up!!!

This movie has a monkey in it who snowboards! He doesn't just snowboard he snowboards so hard and in your face that the only way to possibly describe this monkey's method of snowboarding is to call it.... "extreme!"

He is extreme to the max! If you saw the first 17 MVP movies about a primate who first is a huge hockey star, then a skateboarding star, then a huge star in about 139 other sports that there's no way the rules would actually allow him to even play, then you'll love this new movie where he is snowboarding to the extreme!

This movie has tons of drama and heart as you will wonder if the monkey will succeed in the end. Sure he did it in all the other movies but will he succeed again in yet another sport? Surely he can't be a champion in every sport he tries can he?

More important than that this movie has all kinds of "monkeying around" if you know what I mean.... monkey jokes is what I mean!

My score is 600 billion stars!