"I'm so terrific I have my own toll-free number: 1-800-UNBELIEVABLE." - Ford Fairlane
Let's get right to the topic: The Adventures of Ford Fairlane. I got on a stationary bike and rode my way through this masterpiece. Starring the walking, talking cartoonish persona created by Andrew Clay Silverstein, known and reviled by many as 'Andrew -Dice- Clay.'
As a young man I had heard of the Dice Man. He made me smirk a bit, his stand-up shtick seemed funny enough to listen for a few minutes but then got old fast. In his defense this is my take on most comics who develop a particular set-in-stone persona, for example Gilbert Gottfried. I get bored by comedians who set such rock-solid parameters around themselves. And, of course if the persona is one that makes me cringe like Gilbert Gottfried... I just want to destroy the comic.. redrum redrum murder death kill.
I knew this movie existed, and I knew he made women mad when he hosted Saturday Night Live, but I sort of blamed the women for bothering to be mad at this cartoon character. Demeaning to women? I thought to myself "this guy is demeaning to HIMSELF." But, people can be offended by different things and if he shaved his head and ripped up a picture of the pope, he could have done even more damage I guess. The 'dice man' character is so silly that even when he spouts gross demeaning stuff I always took it as him poking fun at actual dudes who act like that... as opposed to him seriously having anything at all against women. I have never met the guy so who knows. But in my opinion if he was actually trying to put down women in his act it was an Epic Fail (tm), to me he was putting down moronic dudes who thought they were being funny when they said stupid things.
I popped the DVD in and got on the bike, not sure what to expect.And I am still not sure what I got. It's hard for me to even explain. It's kind of like if a few stunted 15 year olds (who liked to get laughs in the classroom by being rude and gross and upsetting those who were easily offended) were suddenly given the titles of Writer, Director and Editor and then given a decent budget to make a movie.
Where to start. The dialogue? The story? The women?
Let's ease in. Yes, tons of hot women in this movie and yes, all treated like meat. What was kind of amazing though is, I ended up respecting them more than the guys. These women all were dressed in skin tight outfits and worked their goods, sure, but for the most part, they didn't seem as dumb and pathetic as the guys. Except for Zu Zu Petals but even she had moments of brain activity... while the guys in this movie..guys were all portrayed as total buffoons. Tough, brainless, and .. yea nothing else. Brutish cartoon characters. Bluto from Popeye could have been seemlessly engrained into this movie.
When Dice was hiding out in a soritity for some reason (production value), and they kept just showing endless T&A shots, it was almost like they were just seeing how many women viewers would sigh in exasperation and get up and walk out of the movie theater leaving their boyfriends behind. It was an endurance test!
Let me talk about the plot. Plot? Let me start at the beginning. On the first day God Created the Dice Man. And all was good, HEY! Hickory Dickory Flambe', the man is a walking Cliche' OH!
So we see him get up, and strut his stuff around his place and I got one laugh. His stereo system was loud enough that the dancing hulu girl on the speakers started shaking.
It's all a blur from that moment till the final credits so I will just share random memories. For some reason they cast Gilbert Gottfried as, well...the annoying Gilbert Gottfried character that people want to kill. This is where the movie delivers. Someone kills Gilbert Gottfried!!! In perhaps the best joke in the movie, they electrocuted him, Get it? Gilbert Gottfried. Got Fried! HEY-O!
So, now that something clever was done, let's mark that box as checked. Something clever will not happen again in this movie.
Dice is a "rock and roll detective" and struts around like a Fonzie-wannabee. Dumpier, ruder, and with one liners that simply are not funny. And, he does voice over narration which is even less funny, but tries a lot harder to be funny. A for effort? I don't see any reason to be insulted or offended, this was Dice light, not his raunchier stage stuff designed to make women shake with rage. I almost would have preferred that, this version was watered down. When you add water to urine, does it make the urine better? Who knows. The only true gross-out the movie went for was when Dice ate a... something.. (shrimp? sushi? who knows) at a party and didn't want to spit it out so he kissed his secretary and during the kiss transferred the food to her mouth. I know what you're not saying, that this was hilarious on paper and just didn't transfer to the screen properly. This kinda grossed me out. More than that, the sheer stupidity of that concept just stood out.
Kudos to this movie for employing Robert Englund (Freddy Kruger) as a deranged Australian hitman who likes to giggle and prance around joyously. Kudos for casting Ed O'Neil from Married with Children (Al Bundy) as a square white cop with a secret past as a... failed soul singer? I gotta admit.. didn't see that coming! Kudos for Wayne Newton for devouring all the scenery from this movie effortlessly as, the bad guy who, ah.. oh hell who knows.He was up to something, who cares what it was.I was rooting for him. He's Wayne Newton!
For some reason everyone is chasing a groupie named Zu Zu Petals and, Ford goes from scene to scene spouting one liners and ogling women in tight dresses while his faithful secretary assists (she secretly but not at all secretly wants to bone him. I believe in real life she at one point married Jim Carrey.. so she went from wanting to bone an offensive American comic in a movie to boning a superior Canadian comic in real life.. I like the story arc of her life in this regard).
Back to the movie. It actually seems more like a series of scenes strung together for the purpose of showing us how desirable Dice is.. ladies he is forceful! He is, um, in leather! His hair is, um.. solid... he can strike rebel poses and make a huge show of lighting his cigarette with his cool lighter. He has a car. Um.. did I mention he poses. Oh! He says things like "Clint Eastwood.. I f*cked him, OH!" and, my theory is that this is supposed to be funny. not that Dice Man is gay. No, really. He goes from scene to scene, on location, being Dice Man. The scene where he grabs a mic and does rockabilly and thrusts his crotch at the camera is.. a horror many would never recover from. He's like Elvis! If Elvis was a jerk, short, kinda dumpy and.. wanted to make everyone uncomfortable. Did Elvis ever f*ck Clinto Eastwood? Check IMDB and report back to me.
So, um Zu Zu acts like a developmentally challenged special needs teen but in a cute way. Dice acts like an emotionally stunted thuggish lout but in dull moronic way. His secretary looks great in a tight dress and, remember, later she gets to marry a Canadian so everything works out for her, don't worry, she does OK. it is painful to see her pine away for Dice Man though. Al Bundy gets to chew scenery as a cop who hates Dice. He has a great time with it. And I bet he was paid well. Gilbert Gottfried.. dies. High Five! Wayne Newton gets to ooze sleaze and chew through bad dialogue. Oh! And they threw in a kid who idolizes Dice, so that we the audience can realize that yes, there is no hope for our children and all is lost. Seriously, I am putting out a bounty on all writers who add precocious kids to movie plots.. bring their severed heads to me and you shall be paid handsomely. The writers' heads not the kids' head! You sickos!
I have to admit I DID enjoyed this movie, some of the dialogue was so bad I laughed out loud. The movie was so cartoonish moronic and cheesy that I wonder.. is this an early example of a movie trying to be so bad that it would be good or, my preferred theory.. is this a movie that 300 lines of coke in the writing room caused to happen?
I still can't quite wrap my head around it. How it happened, why. Who was supposed to like it? Who was talked into funding this? How did the actors make it through the entire movie shoot without coming to their senses and bowing out? How could someone sit down and edit this together without feeling like they just scooped a particularly pungent turd out of the punch bowl and packaged it for sale?
Trivia time. The movie was directed by Renny Harlin, who apparently did NOT take his own life as a result. And made many more movies, that were nothing like this one. Good for you Renny for shaking this Dice Monkey off your back. Renny Harlin? Dice f*cked him OH!
I will close this review by saying I am glad I finally saw this, it was OK to sit through once as long as you were also doing something productive. And here and there I did laugh, there were some diamonds in the rough. And, did I mention they kill Gilbert Gottfried. More movies should have done this!! Such a great concept.
I also laughed hard on how they had a subplot with the little kid and the search for his dad and, they seemingly forgot all about it and resolved it in such a lame way that I had to laugh.
The Amazing Death of Gilbert Gottfried makes me give this movie 5 stars out of 5 but admittedly that says more about my vendetta against Gottfried than about anything else.
Finally, a quote from the movie that I will modify for my summation.
Ford Fairlane: Conversation with Zuzu Petals was like masturbating with a cheese grater: slightly amusing, but mostly painful.
Me: Watching The Adventures of Ford Fairlane was like masturbating with a cheese grater: slightly amusing, but mostly painful.On the plus side Gilbert Gottfried GOT FRIED! OH!
