| Overall Grade: |
F |
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| Story: |
F |
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| Acting: |
D+ |
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| Direction: |
F |
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| Visuals: |
D+ |
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The poor man's Spaceballs
by Caleb (movies profile)
Jul 13, 2007
4
of
4 people found this review helpful
Mars Attacks is obviously a film based on a trading card series, considering that there's no semblance of a plot whatsoever, and the fact that the entire film seems to have been made on a wasted, tired gimmick. Alien films have been spoofed time and again, and in better ways. Maybe Tim Burton is trying to honor Ed Wood, but if so, why did he make a film about Wood already?
It's one of those movies that is so bad it barely qualifies for a direct-to-video release. Except there's so much "star power" (From Jack Nicholson, Pierce Brosnan, Glenn Close, Michael J. Fox, Annette Bening, and than an entire host of second tier movie stars.) here that they had to release it theatrically. No matter, because if it was just the stars, the movie may have stood a chance. The aliens show up and everything goes to hell.
For the record, the film's thin semblance of a plot can be coined in the title. Martians attack Earth, and nobody knows how to kick their asteroids. It doesn't help Earth that the president (Jack Nicholson) is a blithering idiot of Bush-like proportions, who is being jerked around by his stereotypical staff of greedy lecherous types. At first, mankind tries to make piece with the Martians, who just proceed to kill everyone in sight. Wait, no, they abduct Sarah Jessica Parker and put her head on her dog's body for some strange, unexplained reason. Earth, being as stupid as Earth is in any good sci-fi film, gives the Martians a second chance. They kill more people, and abduct Brosnan. He gets lucky and is just taken apart. So we get Brosnan and Parker's decapitated heads flirting with each other. That's pretty much the high point of the film.
If you've ever seen the Topps trading cards, you're familiar with the acts of violence the Martians engage in. They shrink people and squash them, they try to fry a helpless old lady, and they carve their own faces in Mount Rushmore. But Burton isn't really sure what to do with his Martians. They wind up as a bizarre cross between the Gremlins from Gremlins and the Gungans (Jar-Jar Binks) from Star Wars. They're googly eyed creatures, who speak in clicks and have giant brains. Apparently they're telapathic, but Burton doesn't really touch much on this. He's more interested in showing the Martians chasing kids around the White House and trashing Las Vegas.
This is why movies shouldn't be made based only on the cast. All of the actors involved, as well as most of the crew, have done better. Hell, even Tom Jones (Who shows up as himself and is attacked by Martians during one of his stage shows) is above this material. Even as a spoof, Mars Attacks is pretty weak. The problem is that it isn't as funny as a spoof should be. I'm not sure if I'm supposed to laugh at James Brown knocking Martians around, or laugh when pervy Michael J. Fox gets his finger bitten off by an (obvious) incognito Martian assassin. The only actors who seem to really have fun with the material are, as said above, Parker and Brosnan. Everybody else takes the film seriously, like they're actually in a dramatic movie. The point of a spoof is that the actors know it's bad, and act as such. Nicholson's "Why can't we all just get along?" speech seems very heavy-handed for something on this level.
If you're amused by sadistic little aliens engaging in acts of cruelty against the human race, you may actually enjoy Mars Attacks. For me, the film got tired and redundant, and I spent half of it trying to figure out WHY Jack Nicholson had two seperate roles in the film. Danny Elfman's score is really the only real reason to see this film, and for that I recommend buying the soundtrack (It's out there) at a used CD store, because it'll cost less than renting this garbage. |
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