Two years ago Sony Pictures signed Alicia Silverstone to a two-picture deal reportedly worth $10 million. If you haven't heard much about that coup lately, it's because ``Excess Baggage'' - their seemingly jinxed first collaboration - has gone through numerous re-shoots and been shuttled in and out of editing rooms for well over a year now.
All in vain, unfortunately: ``Excess Baggage'' still amounts to a series of flaccid, go-nowhere scenes featuring a sullen Silverstone and the inarticulate Benicio Del Toro (the least memorable of ``The Usual Suspects''), an actor almost as alluring as a bowl of rotting fruit. Though Christopher Walken and Harry Connick Jr. turn up occasionally along the way, they fail to relieve the general dreariness.
The threadbare story offers up Silverstone as Emily, a poor little heiress who stages her own kidnapping to get the attention of her business-minded daddy. Del Toro's Vincent is a master car thief who inadvertently takes Emily for a ride, then can't shake her.
Executive producer Silverstone may have seen this film as a chance to segue from ``Clueless'' to ``Breathless,'' but what could have been a rowdy romantic caper turns out to be a lethargic slog across Washington State with two abrasive bores. As Emily and Vincent vacantly snipe at each other, ``Excess'' has the feel of a misconceived improvisation-comedy sketch that goes on interminably without ever coming close to being funny.
Del Toro's slurred speech and blurry eyes make him seem more like Cheech and Chong's lost cousin than a hunky bad boy. And ``Excess'' is irrefutable evidence Silverstone needs a strong director to bring out her effervescence, since it's nowhere to be found here.
The movie's patchwork production is betrayed by the obvious fluctuations in Silverstone's figure from scene to scene. ``Do you like my tummy?'' Emily asks Vincent at one point, and you half-expect him to answer, ``Which one?''.
James Sanford
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