BOGUS
A film review by Steve Rhodes
Copyright 1997 Steve Rhodes
RATING (0 TO ****): ** 1/2
BOGUS (1996) is a fantasy about an invisible friend. People who exist only in one's imagination are common in childhood and in films. Perhaps the best known of the latter is the movie HARVEY (1950), which plays on the television in BOGUS lest we miss the connection of this show to a greater one from the past.
As the show opens, effusively happy Albert Franklin has a mother, Lorraine (Nancy Travis), and plenty of visible friends. Lorraine works as a magician's assistant in a traveling act, which is now playing on the Vegas strip.
Albert is played by Haley Joel Osment in the strongest performance in the movie. Haley, whom you may recognize as Forrest Junior in FORREST GUMP, is as assertive as he is cute. His voice projects with an authority that surpasses many adults.
Shortly after the beginning of the story, Albert's mother is killed in a car accident. Director Norman Jewison cuts away quickly so as to remove any chance of emotional impact. Throughout this uneven movie he will retain this proclivity to shy away from more than surface depth. The script by Francis X. McCarthy, Jeff Rothberg and Alvin Sargent suffers from a similar problem. The characters, Albert being the exception, are outlined adequately, but they are only partially filled in, leaving the viewer with a frustratingly incomplete feeling.
By the provisions of the his mother's will, Albert is packed off to Newark, New Jersey to live with his mother's foster sister Harriet (Whoopi Goldberg), who did not know Albert existed. (Albert's father is explained away as a "fly-by-night," with his mother not even knowing his last name.) Since Albert is white and Harriet is black, this might cause some challenges to be dealt with, but this script pays the issue scant attention.
Graffiti-encased Newark is cast against type. Rather than its usual collection of drug dealers and gangs, we see it as a friendly working class town. Nary a bad guy shows his head. For those of us who have lived in New Jersey, albeit not in Newark, it is refreshing to see someone look upon its brighter side.
As Albert travels on the plane to go to live with Harriet, a large French stranger named Bogus (Gerard Depardieu) materializes out of a drawing Albert has made. Since Bogus can be seen and heard only by Albert, we have the canonical set of scenes where Albert talks to Bogus and a confused Harriet asks to whom Albert is speaking.
Although the child actor gives an excellent performance, the adults are merely adequate. Depardieu plays his part whimsically, but little more. A more complex interpretation of his character would have helped. Similarly, Goldberg has the tough part right as the owner of a small business, but her role as a reluctant mother is not believable. She develops little genuine chemistry with anyone else in the picture.
It is plausible that Harriet starts off tough. ("This isn't going to work. I haven't had a conversation with a child since I was a child.") But when the inevitable emotional crack finally comes, it happens too late and too unconvincingly.
Notwithstanding these problems, the film does have its magical moments and none more so than when Harriet and Bogus are transformed in a daydream to a pair of dancers a la Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers. This scene was presaged earlier in another movie on the television.
While always pleasant and sometime downright charming, Jewison's film remains strangely uninvolving. The ingredients are there but he has trouble staging them into a compelling whole.
BOGUS runs too long at 1:50. It is rated PG for a little bad language and its more serious themes. It would be fine for kids around 6 and up. My son Jeffrey, age 8, said he thought the film was "okay, but it can get a little boring at times." His favorite part is when the boy does magic tricks. Since I never disliked the film and since there are several touchingly funny portions, I am giving the film a mild thumbs up and ** 1/2.
**** = A must see film. *** = Excellent show. Look for it. ** = Average movie. Kind of enjoyable. * = Poor show. Don't waste your money. 0 = Totally and painfully unbearable picture.
REVIEW WRITTEN ON: July 5, 1997
Opinions expressed are mine and not meant to reflect my employer's.
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