Once more I demonstrate how much I like movies that hardly anyone else does by saying that I really get a kick out of Bowfinger. Steve Martin plays the title character, a movie producer who makes Ed Wood look successful. He wants to direct a script, and he has one written by his accountant that he's sure is perfect. It's called Chubby Rain, and the premise has to do with aliens hiding in raindrops. Martin contrives to meet a big-time movie exec (played by Robert Downey, Jr.) at a restaurant, and the exec agrees to distribute the movie if Martin can land the biggest action star around, Kit Ramsey (Eddie Murphy, Jr.).
His meeting with Kit doesn't go well, but Martin's going ahead with the movie, anyway. How? Simple. He'll have his actors walk up to Murphy in public and say their lines while Martin films the scene with a hidden camera. Will it work? Martin tells them that Tom Cruise didn't know he was in that "vampire movie" until two years after it was shot.
Things go well until Kit, who's a head case, goes into hiding. He's a member of a cult called MindHead, and thinks aliens are stalking him. Martin finds someone who looks just like Kit, however, a guy named Jiff. We learn soon enough that the resemblance is only natural since Jiff is Kit's brother.
That's enough about the plot, which is even more complicated than it sounds, though it plays just fine. Much hilarity ensues (for me, anyway), and the cast is terrific. Murphy hasn't been very successful in recent years, but he does a wonderful job as both Jiff and Kit. I've been a fan of Steve Martin since he was on The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour with an arrow through his head, and he's great, as usual. Heather Graham, Christine Baranski, Downey, and all the rest are their equals. I laugh just thinking about some of the scenes in this movie. It's not cutting edge or even close, but it's very funny. Check it out.
10 comments:
Went to the theater to see this film and recall laughing like a nut. Been awhile but I remember Eddie crossing the ridiculously busy street was one highlight.
The road-crossing was a real highlight of a fine film--but why did they try to sink it with a title like that?
Yes, that is the scene that stands out when you think of this. I liked it a lot too.
Man I LOVE this movie to the highest power. One of the funniest films Martin or Murphy ever did. In college I spent a month or so with some guerrilla undergrad film makers. They were right out of this movie. Half the handheld shots were unusable because the kid with the camera had the shakes from a bad acid trip and the kid who was the director had clearly cast the girl with lascivious acts in mind. :) I hadn't liked Martin or Murphy in many years but this film reminded me of why they'd become famous in the first place.
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I guess I'm not the only one who likes this, after all.
I'm halfway with Daniel--the title put me off, too, but so much so that I've never watched the film. I'm a small man.
Sounds like my kind of movie. (In some ways, my favorite Steve Martin movie is "Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid." For reasons that will be obvious to any lover of 1940s PI movies.)
I've done an "Overlooked Movies" post on that one, Don. It's a favorite of mine.
I ran across a reference to BOWFINGER a couple weeks ago and thought that I need to rewatch. There are a number of Hollywood fads and nonsense that the film skewers.
This is yet another film I land in the middle of and keep meaning to see. Sounds like the skewering of Scientology alone might put it a certain Robert's wheelhouse...Heather Graham is never a dissuading factor for me.
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