Screen Scene

Friday, October 2, 1998

Screen Scene

"What Dreams May Come"

Directed by Vincent Ward

Starring Robin Williams and Annabella Sciorra

Perhaps the year’s most ambitious film, "What Dreams May Come"
ultimately comes apart because it is too idealistic. The creation
of a modern film with well-known performers which contains a
spiritual, life-affirming message is indeed a high concept for a
Hollywood studio, and the decision to back the film is a testament
to the bravery of Polygram Entertainment. However, the film is so
insistent on being moving and deep that it forgets that it must
also entertain during its too-long, two hours-plus running
time.

Robin Williams, in his most dreary and humorless performance to
date, portrays Chris Nielson, a pediatrician whose children died
four years earlier in a freak car accident. One day, while trying
to help the wounded after a different car accident, he is killed by
oncoming traffic. His wife (Annabella Sciorra) kills herself from
the grief, and sets the plot into motion. Because suicides are
relegated to "Hell," Nielson must travel from his own personal
Heaven down to Hell to rescue his lost love.

This story undoubtedly contains a lot of morbidity and
rightfully focuses on death. However, the movie is constantly
maudlin without even a touch of levity or relief (surprising
considering that Williams is one of our funniest performers). More
than two hours of retrospection on the nature of love and death is
fine, but "What Dreams May Come" is so content to wallow in human
misery that it is likely to bore the audience into submission.

Even the dazzling visual effects sequences in which Nielson
envisions his Heaven as a painted landscape are dulled by the
ceaseless self-pity and depression that runs throughout the film
from opening credits to denouement.

Director Vincent Ward and screenwriter Ron Bass would have been
better served to give even passing attention to the adventure
elements of the story (how can a journey through the entire
afterlife seem so slow and boring?) and to allow Williams to
occasionally let his good humor shine through all the darkness.

Lonnie Harris

"A Night at the Roxbury"

Directed by John Fortenberry

Starring Will Ferrell and Chris Kattan

The Butabi Brothers have become one of the most popular skits in
recent "Saturday Night Live" memory. The goofy duo, brought to life
by "comedians in name only" Will Ferrell and Chris Kattan, are
recognized by their techno-pop soundtrack (mainly Hadaway’s "What
Is Love"), their ceaseless head-bopping and their merciful lack of
dialogue.

The skit is somewhat funny for the two minutes it lasts on the
weekly variety program, mainly because of the guest hosts
(including Jim Carrey, Tom Hanks and Jack Nicholson) and their
takes on the characters. The notion that this silly trifle was
enough to sustain a 90-minute movie was perhaps the most misguided
idea producer Lorne Michaels ever had, and that is saying a lot
when one considers his past credits ("Coneheads," "Blues Brothers
2000" and "It’s Pat").

The resulting film, "A Night at the Roxbury," is not merely the
least funny film of the year – it is bordering on tragedy. People
will leave the theater (early in many cases) without so much as a
chuckle or even a cracked smile.

The plot, really an excuse for a variety of idiotic set pieces
and unfunny running jokes, concerns the Butabi brothers, well-to-do
but horribly stupid twenty-somethings who try to no avail to make
it on the L.A. nightclub scene. They are rejected because of their
total lack of fashion sense, their inability to deal with the
opposite sex and their ridiculous excuse for dancing (the
aforementioned headbutting), and rightfully so. And while the plot
demands that these two characters be charming and sympathetic,
Ferrell and Kattan never make them anything but grating and
obnoxious.

This, however, is only one minor part of "Roxbury’s" downfall.
In essence, it was a movie doomed to failure. Ferrell and Kattan
are simply not funny enough to pull off a feature film, end of
story. These two prove through their repetitive and lackluster
script that they lack basic skills of comedy writing, and prove
through their performances that they are incapable of anything even
resembling physical comedy.

"A Night at the Roxbury" is not just a bad movie. It is an
insult to the intelligence of audiences everywhere. Always ready
and willing to stoop to any level of stupidity for a laugh that
never comes, it is perhaps the worst in a long line of bad SNL
spin-off films.

Lonnie Harris

"Antz"

Directed by Eric Darnell and Tim Johnson

Starring Woody Allen and Sharon Stone

Whereas the typical animated feature (Disney or no) eventually
relies on slapstick comedy and formulaic "fairy tale" storytelling,
"Antz" is a real story with real characters, who just happen to be
computer generated talking bugs.

The film follows Z, voiced by Woody Allen, a worker ant who has
grown tired of the endless monotony that his station in life
provides. He wants to care about the colony, but he yearns to be an
individual, and he lusts after the beautiful daughter of the Queen
Ant, Princess Bala (Sharon Stone). A series of mix-ups and a bit of
luck finds Z and Bala trapped outside of the colony together, and
they must rely on one another to navigate the terrifying atmosphere
of New York’s Central Park.

All of this plot aside, "Antz" is really a character-based
comedy, relying heavily on clever gags comparing human life on
Earth to the daily existence of an ant within a colony.

The script is quite witty, opting to find humor in dialogue,
rather than outlandish visuals or physical comedy. This is no easy
task when one considers that the field of animation has been
thought of as an exclusively visual medium.

"Antz," though it contains nothing terribly inappropriate, is
not a film designed for children. Jeffrey Katzenberg and DreamWorks
have made a new type of animated film – one that is often
better-written and more observant than most live-action films.

Most of the humor, however, will only be appreciated by
teenagers and above, and children are likely to have problems
following the complex storyline and understanding the characters
elevated and verbose dialogue.

Lonnie Harris

Paramount Pictures

Chris Kattan (left) plays Doug Butabi and Will Ferrell plays his
brother Steve in the comedy "A Night at the Roxbury."

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© 1998 ASUCLA Communications Board