OSMOSIS JONES (2001) Rated PG; running time 95 minutes Genre: Live action and animated Seen at: Jack Lokes' Celebration Cinema (Lansing, Michigan) Official site: http://www.osmosisjones.com/ IMDB site: http://us.imdb.com/Details?0181739 Written by: Marc Hyman Directed by: Piet Kroon, Tom Sito (animation); Peter and Bobby Farrelly (live action) Cast: Chris Rock, David Hyde Pierce, Laurence Fishburne, Brandy, William Shatner, Ron Howard, Joel Silver (voice) Bill Murray, Elena Franklin, Molly Shannon, Chris Elliott (live-action)
Review Copyright Rose Cooper, 2001 Review URL: http://www.3blackchicks.com/bamsosmosis.html
The hardest part about 3BC having been more or less down for two weeks, is coming back to review new movies that I really didn't want to watch. AMERICAN PIE 2? Ewww. THE OTHERS? Not my speed. SPY KIDS, The Director's Cut? Fat chance. And as queasy as I am, the thought of watching the grossout humor of OSMOSIS JONES just wasn't twisting my throttle. But a Chick's gotta review *something*, I reckon; and there is the matter of one Laurence Fishburne, with a little David Hyde Pierce, being part of the action. In the end, Fishburne and Pierce they almost cancelled out the Farrelly Brothers' influence. Well, almost.
The Story (WARNING: **spoilers contained below**) Frank Pepperidge is, in a word, filthy - inside and out. A misunderstood widower, only his daughter Shane (Elena Franklin) seems to be trying to help Frank find a clue again; Shane constantly fights a losing battle to get Frank to eat healthy, exercise, and generally live right, but not even a stint in the Army can help Fr...oops, wrong movie. Uh...Frank's equally nasty bud Bob (Chris Elliott) is as codependent as they come; and after Frank...loosed himself on Shane's teacher Mrs. Boyd (Molly Shannon), Frank's gettin' no love from that side of the aisle, either.
But Frank has a whole crew waiting in the wings to help him. Actually, they're waiting inside Frank's body: fighting off colds, allergies, Twinkies, and the occasional monkey-handled egg, are a team of hard-working antibodies and white-blood cells, the most strident of which is Officer Osmosis Jones (voice of Chris Rock). Due to a bad history old Ozzie has with his Police Chief (Joel Silver), Oz is initially banished to patrolling the boring mouth sector of The City Of Frank; but when Cold Tablet Drixoral (David Hyde Pierce) is dispatched to fight off what the Chief, Mayor Phlegmming (William Shatner), and Brand...I mean, the Mayor's assistant, Leah (Brandy) think is merely a cold virus, Ozzie is assigned to help Drix relieve Frank's symptoms. What begins as a routine cleanup of the sewer that is Frank, though, soon turns into Something Else, when Ozzie discovers that a SuperVirus named Thrax (Laurence Fishburne) is out to terminate Frank.
[Man, does that look weird typed-out.]
The Upshot: I can describe OSMOSIS JONES in three words: "punny", "nasty", and "PG". That last bit - that is, the film's PG rating - holds the key to its lack of success, I think; and, keeping my disdain for the Farrellys' previous effort, ME, MYSELF & IRENE in mind, my acknowledgement of that rating's shortcomings is also the source of some discomfort for me.
You see, I opine that with that rein-in-the-madcap PG rating acting as an albatross hanging around its neck, OSMOSIS JONES didn't, *couldn't*, go far enough in making itself funnier to adult viewers. In our abbreviated audience (the empty seats, no doubt, were due to the throngs who rushed to see Pie Deux), you could hear a pin drop as pun after pun fell on deaf ears: the adults who thought the humor was merely "cute", and the kidlets who'd forgotten everything they knew about the "science" of OSMOSIS JONES well before summer break began.
That's too bad, too; I really wanted OJ [sorry] to succeed. Certainly, the cast should have been up for it; with its collection of comics, humorists, and damn fine actors, one would think OJ's success was written in the stars. To be sure, Fishburne tore it up as Thrax, the baddest mutha of a germ this side of ebola - though I couldn't help but think about the inherent problems with trying to make a seemingly AIDS-like virus, *funny*; that Sir Laurence succeeded, and playfully so, is a testament to just how great an actor he is, even with this type of material. Pierce, an equally great comic actor in his own right (if you've never seen this modern-day Buster Keaton as "Niles" from FRASIERR, you don't know what you've been missing), made a wonderful Drix, though I was reminded of his similar voice acting in A BUG'S LIFE; the comparison is favorable, but still, too similar.
Bill Murray reinvented his CADDYSHACK character, though besides the icky subject matter itself, Murray's character was the other primary reason I hesitated on going to see OSMOSIS JONES in the first place; I had hoped Murray would've gotten past all of that by now. Watching Murray Go There Again was distressing, much the same as if, for instance, Steve Martin suddenly picked up his Wild And Crazy Guy schtick again...ewww. Still, a slovenly Frank was necessary for OJ to work - and my reservations aside, I can think of no better actor to have played this slob than Murray. As for the balance of the cast, I had to be reminded that William "KHAAAAN!" Shatner voiced The Mayor Of Frank, so my Issues weren't really with him, nor was it with Ron "Opie" Howard's brief punny bit as Tom Colonic, the Mayor's chief rival, or singer Brandy as The Mayor's headstrong assistant, Leah. Even Chris Rock, who normally gets on my nerves in too large a dose, was quite tame as OSMOSIS JONES.
Aye, there's the rub. Rock was tame; *too* tame, methinks. He tried hard, but even with the likes of Fishburne and Pierce helping to class up the joint, he couldn't seem to elevate OSMOSIS JONES beyond the its punny nature, saddled with the limitations of its diluted grossout humor. Look for a few chuckles here and there, a couple of good lines (Fishburne has the best one late in the movie), and a cute riff on Fishburne's THE MATRIX - but don't expect too much here. Like I said, too bad.
Bammer's Bottom Line: Surely, there must be a compromise between the all-out illness of an R-rated "Irene" and the cute but PG-weakened punnyness of an OSMOSIS JONES, some middle ground where adults can get their laugh groove on without having our intelligence insulted, isn't there? I'm still looking for that middle ground - though you'll notice I'm not holding my breath.
OSMOSIS JONES (rating: flashing yellowlight): Diagnosis: too much Farrelly, not enough funny.
Rose "Bams" Cooper Webchick and Editor, 3BlackChicks Review Entertainment Reviews With Flava! Copyright Rose Cooper, 2001 EMAIL: bams@3blackchicks.com http://www.3blackchicks.com/
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