WOO A film review by Steve Rhodes Copyright 1998 Steve Rhodes
RATING (0 TO ****): * 1/2
With the mark of true talent, Jada Pinkett Smith, who was Eddie Murphy's girlfriend in the recent remake of THE NUTTY PROFESSOR, manages to shine in the otherwise dismal movie WOO. With her infectiously happy smile, the beautiful actress has enough spunk and confidence to rise above the material. Although not quite enough to make the movie enjoyable, her performance does give some respite to the audience, who has to endure every black and male stereotype in the book.
As the movie opens, a sexy and mini-skirted Woo (Smith) sashays down a busy Manhattan sidewalk. Men left and right trip and fall as they gawk at her. She is going to get advice on how to find her Mr. Right from her transvestite psychic named Celestrial. As Celestrial, a performer known as Girlina overacts like the rest of the supporting cast.
With only the knowledge of his zodiac sign, Woo sets off to find her man. When a blind date named Tim, played by the wholesome-looking Tommy Davidson from BOOTY CALLS, turns out to have the good fortune to have been born in the right time frame, she figures she has her man. After a scene in which Tim practices various come-on lines to arouse who he thinks will be a reluctant date, she walks into his apartment, sticks a joint in his mouth and starts taking off his pants. And this all happens in the initial two minutes after she first meets him.
Much of the movie is devoted to Tim's three sexist buddies, played by Duane Martin, Darrel Heath, and Michael Ralph. They make catcalls at every woman they see. Mixed with their disparaging remarks on the woman's anatomy, they stick out their tongues to make sexually provocative gestures. Think ANIMAL HOUSE on steroids.
As written by David C. Johnson and directed by Daisy von Scherler Mayer, the picture, with its heavy slapstick, feels lifted from some raunchy cable sitcom with a heavy laugh track. No gesture is too crude to include and no situation too cliched. When Tim takes Woo to a fancy restaurant, you could predict that someone will soon slip and fall resulting in a big food fight, and you'd be right. And when Tim tries to light some incense in his bathroom, you know something will catch on fire - this time it's the toilet paper roll.
Although most of the jokes go nowhere, one that does work involves Tim's prize possession, his car, which is guarded with all kinds of anti-theft devices. He returns from a nightclub to beep the car open, only to find that, like the Cheshire cat, all that is left in the street is a trace - the car's beeper. It still beeps back even the object it was protecting is gone forever.
"This is funny; this is funny," Tim tells Woo at one point. "This is funny?" she queries. "What does that mean?" She doesn't know, and neither did the makers of this movie.
WOO runs just 1:25. It is rated R for profanity and sexual situations and would be fine for older teenagers.
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