Analyze This (Reviewed on March 7/99)
Starring Robert DeNiro, Billy Crystal, Lisa Kudrow
When I originally saw the trailer for "Analyze This" a few months ago, I must admit, I thought it looked kind of lame. And then when the commercials started popping up a week or two ago, I thought it looked outright bad. But then when "Analyze This" finally opened a few days ago, an odd thing happened. It got great reviews. Critics were proclaiming it "hilarious" and a "dead-on parody of mob movies". Well, with praise like that, I figured, it must be good and so I headed off to the theater. You know that expression that says always trust your gut instincts? Well, turns out that expression is more valid than I ever gave it credit for.
"Analyze This" is slow, unfunny, and badly acted. Don't get me wrong, I think that DeNiro is one of the top ten greatest actors of the century, but he is just out of his league here. I think the problem is he didn't quite know how to approach this material. He plays his character, mob boss Paull Vitti, somewhere in between the realm of comedy and drama. If he had played the character straight, along the lines of Leslie Nielson in the "Naked Gun" series, he probably would have been a lot more successful. As it is, though, he plays the character completely serious at some moments, and for laughs at others. This doesn't work. It creates an uneven character that never breaks out of the DeNiro mold; you always know it's him.
And the movie is badly paced, too. It never takes off. It just crawls from one scene to another without any forward momentum. I think the blame for this should be placed on the script. It's obvious the writer had a good idea for a movie, mob boss faces breakdown and needs the services of a psychiatrist, but once this is established, the movie doesn't really go anywhere. The formula of the film seems to be this: Billy Crystal says no to DeNiro, DeNiro forces him, and much wackiness ensues. This formula of sorts is repeated several times throughout the movie.
I've said it before and I'll say it again: The only thing that matters to me in a comedy is whether or not it's funny. If "Analyze This" had been funny, the pacing and bad acting wouldn't have bothered me. I would have been too busy laughing to notice. But as it is, I only chuckled a few times. The only really funny scene is a dead-on parody of "The Godfather". Sadly, though, I don't think anyone in the audience I saw it with realized it was a parody, because I was the only one laughing.
But my sense of humour, I have come to realize, is vastly different from the general population. I loathed "There's Something About Mary", yet loved "BASEketball". Now, if you want a movie that *I* think is funny, go out and see "Office Space". It's full of genuine laughs and won't leave you glancing at your watch every 10 minutes, as "Analyze This" did.
* out of ****
--
David Nusair http://chat.carleton.ca/~dnusair
"As I have pointed out before, Andre Rousimoff's portrayal of a giant in
"The Princess Bride", Richard Dawson's portrayal of an obnoxious game show
host in "The Running Man", and Courtney Love's portrayal of a junkie hooker
in "The People vs Larry Flynt"."
-R. Wiley on the all-time biggest Oscar snubs
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