Mediocrity, Meet Thy Neighbour: Ineptitude
Spoilers
Our cinematic visit last week found us presented with a choice. Rather than being stuck between a rock and a hard place, we more faced a stone aged jam. (I'll get my coat...) The choice, as the title and poor joke suggest, was between the sequel to the surprisingly good The Croods or the sequel to the childhood classic Space Jam. On closer inspection, when no one could pick which they fancied least, it appeared that timings would allow one to follow the other, so boldly we stepped forward...
The Croods 2: A New Dawn
3/5
I remember going to see the first The Croods. It looked childish, lazy, and predictable from the trailers. I remember planning to avoid it but ending up at it, I assume, through misadventure. I remember being pleasantly surprised to find something colourful, creative, vaguely novel, and quite funny. It avoided many of the drab visual cues often anticipated in Stone Age films (lots of arid wildernesses, lots of browns, lots of beiges) and invented a world of colour filled with creatures and plants different to those of our own.
That trick did not pay off this time. I knew what the world of The Croods was like so the lack of magic from being immersed in it for the first time left the cracks in the film very unfilled. The first two thirds are very uninspired. It follows a 'keeping up with the neighbours' culture clash between two families, with the bonus 'teenage love triangle' (sort of) thrown in for free. It predictably rolls over every plot twist and move you expect, leading to all parties shouting at each other over dinner. Five monkeys with typewriters would need a spare weekend to have knocked the script out. The Flinstones-esque use of animals did little to enliven it.
And then suddenly there are actual monkeys in the film. The 'better Dad' character, Phil Betterman (ha. ha.), reveals he has been hording and tributing bananas to a mysterious monster, revealed to be a tribe of punch-monkeys. Who then kidnap him and the other male characters because they in turn were re-tributing the bananas to a giant monster monkey. From there on in it persists in getting sillier. Suddenly, the film turns around. The gag rate shoots up, the nonsensical nature of the plot becomes creative once more, and I was able to revel in the 'punch monkeys' and 'spider-wolves' with glee.
Animation is often at its best when it is wild, unpredictable, and allows some non sequiturs. Often it is at its worst when it merely follows the guidebook. A creative gem like The Croods only worked through its surprises. It is no surprise then that The Croods 2 only picks up when the creators decided to have a bit of actual fun.
The Croods 2: A New Age, 2021
Director: Joel Crawford
Writers: Dan Hageman, Kevin Hageman, Paul Fisher, & Bob Logan
Composer: Mark Mothersbaugh
Starring: Nicolas Cage, Emma Stone, Ryan Reynolds, Catherine Keener, Clark Duke, Cloris Leachman, Peter Dinklage, Leslie Mann, & Kelly Marie Tran
Currently showing in major cinemas across the U.K.
Space Jam: A New Legacy
2/5
One of the highlights of a childhood in the 1990s has got to be Space Jam. Even for a country which doesn't follow basketball, Michael Jordan had enough cultural kudos to draw a crowd. And the idea of a live action film with Looney Tunes interaction? Brilliant! Aside from the film itself, Warner Bros. threw all of their publicity at the film, with trailers, sponsorship deals, collectors cards, and some pretty awesome toys. My sister and I got several of the toys - for each Looney Tune character, you got a free Michael Jordan. Her favourite was blue shirted Michael Jordan. Mine was the special boxset I got for Christmas which featured three toys of Jordan playing different sports from the film (baseball, golf, and basketball). It was a glorious time.
You would not win a very large bet in predicting my excitement at the prospect of a reboot-sequel. I was not thrilled by the idea at all. Space Jam holds a special nostalgic space in my heart, in a similar area to the likes of Aladdin, TV's Gargoyles, or Toy Story. Unlike any of the latter, though, I do appreciate that the original Space Jam was probably not actually very good. A quick look at Wikipedia will tell you its critical response on Rotten Tomatoes rates around 44%. With such a rather creaky nostalgia spring board, slightly splintering at the base and peeling around the edges, could Space Jam: A New Legacy ever fulfil its title's lofty ambitions?
The answer is clearly no. No it couldn't. There are three primary reasons why. The first is the most obvious: LeBron James. It becomes very apparent very quickly that James can't really act. He's not terrible by any stretch of the imagination, but you can tell that he's acting. Some turns come out alright in the wash, but many sections are slightly hampered by the paint-by-numbers style of acting. You can almost see his theatrical coach stood at the edge of every shot, giving him wildly gesticulated clues on how to perform. This inherent weakness sets the whole film on an uneven keel.
The second issue is the Looney Tune plot. The main focus of the film is on James. When he arrives in the 'Warner Bros. Server', a key aspect of the weird digital plot, he finds Tune World deserted, save for Bugs Bunny. Apparently the Tunes had all been persuaded to leave by Al G. Rhythm (...), the film's bad guy, leaving Bugs alone trying to find out what it means to be 'looney'. And then... that idea is pretty much ignored. The film is so wrapped up in the 'Plotting for Dummies' story of James not understanding his son that it kind of forgets all about this plot until Bugs sacrifices himself in some odd last ditch attempt at an emotional arc. What the writers miss is that we're going to Space Jam for the cartoons, not the late-career basketball star.
This leads nicely into the third issue, which is linked. The writers of the film also seem to not really understand is what 'comedy' actually is. The script is a joke Sahara. Those that do appear are, well, just not very funny. At the heart of this is a lack of awareness of how Looney Tune humour works. The original Chuck Jones shorts are masterpieces of cartoon violence and slapstick comedy. When Wile E. Cayote is blown up trying to capture Road Runner, it is not funny because he was blown up by TNT; it was funny because he ordered the dynamite from the specialist delivery company Acme, he laid an incredibly clever and complicated trap that defied the rules of physics over what appears to be several hours, and yet is outwitted at the last minute by Road Runner. The comedy is in the set up. The timing is key. Yet the creators of this edition of Space Jam seem convinced that throwing anvils into the mix every few minutes suffices for comedy.
Probably the most amusing aspect of the film was Warner Bros. attempt at Wreck-it Ralphing their studio into some form of corporate synergy. Where Ralph Breaks the Internet brought wry amusement as the heroes stumbled passed Iron Man, storm troopers, and Eeyore, before falling into the Disney Princess Room, being constantly reminded that Warner Bros. own the rights to Harry Potter and Game of Thrones was rather bizarre. Weirder still was insisting on putting Pennywise on the side-lines of a basketball game at the centre of a kids' movie. In trying to show that the 'Warner Bros. Universe' is a real (albeit digital) place where all of the greatest cinematic (and TV, I guess) moments have happened, it came across as clunky and like the writers could only name twenty properties from over an hundred years of history.
"But why 2/5 and not 1/5?" I hear you cry in bewilderment. And I can understand your confusion. The short answer is that I just didn't hate it. It still worked as a film. And I quite like Don Cheadle. Even when playing a poor attempt at a pun (the aforementioned sentient computer algorithm, Al G. Rhythm, that unsurprisingly was, and possibly is, running Warner Bros.) he put in a fun performance.
According to Wikipedia they're contemplating a third film in the series, bringing Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson in as the lead. At least that will fix one of the problems. Now they just need to get some writers who understand jokes and have watched Looney Tunes before writing the script to seal the deal!
Space Jam: A New Legacy, 2021
Director: Malcolm D. Lee
Writers: Juel Taylor, Tony Rettenmaier, Keenan Coogler, Terence Nance, Jesse Gordon, & Celeste Ballard
Composer: Kris Bowers
Starring: LeBron James, Don Cheadle, Cedric Joe, Jeff Bergman, Eric Bauza, & Zendaya
Currently showing in major cinemas across the U.K.
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