FAT CHANCE
BIG MOMMA'S HOUSE
Directed by Raja Gosnell
Screenplay by Darryl Quarles and Don Rhymer
With Martin Lawrence, Nia Long
(Theater) PG-13 97 min
Probably the scene that lost me was the early one where the fat lady rushes into the bathroom, hikes up her dress, sinks with a sigh onto the toilet, and lets go with loud, flatulent diarrhea, while Martin Lawrence, hiding in the shower, makes "Oh boy does it stink!" faces. Now, there are people who think that's hilarious, I imagine, or they wouldn't have put it in a comedy. There must have been chuckles at the pitch, chortles at the script conferences, and guffaws on the set. There weren't any in the theater where I saw it.
In fact, this entire 97-minute exercise in movie comedy was pretty much laugh-free. Take a little Tootsie (a great comedy), run it through a few reels of Mrs. Doubtfire (a pretty funny picture), dredge it in some Nutty Professor (now we're showing signs of strain), and by the time it comes out here, we're talking about a severely depleted comic gene pool.
Martin Lawrence is an appealing guy, but he doesn't seem to have a sure fix on what's funny. Here he's an FBI man who's a master of disguise, and when Sherry (Nia Long), the ex-girlfriend of an escaped convict (Terrence Howard), goes to hide out at her granny's, and granny gets called out of town, it's an opportunity made in comedy hell. As quick as you can say Little Red Ridinghood, Lawrence has disguised himself with enough latex to keep a Nevada whorehouse in condoms for a decade, and he's greeting Sherry on the front walk with a big hug saying "Big Momma could never forget that ass.ma."
Nia Long, who showed well in The Best Man, is a lovely actress who will certainly live this down. Terrence Howard, the cynic from that same movie, is reasonably menacing as the villain, but he's on so little you hardly notice. The director, Raja Gosnell, has directed a couple of pictures (Never Been Kissed, Home Alone 3), but he must have caught this bug while editing Mrs. Doubtfire. But that had Robin Williams, and a script. This one made it to the screen without an ounce of wit or originality.
This is the picture that famously landed Lawrence in the hospital with heat stroke as he was jogging in heavy clothes to lose weight. Martin, baby, it wasn't worth it.
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