Flak Magazine: Review of Big Trouble, 4-21-02

Dennis Miller said "What makes us laugh is a mystery — an involuntary response." There is another adage that "comedy equals tragedy plus time." Let William Shakespeare chime in, and he'd tell you that "brevity is the soul of wit." Intentional or unintentional, these ideas are all over Big Trouble.

Apparently, six months is enough for tragedy to become comedy. Big Trouble was originally supposed to come out Sept. 14, but because of a few scenes featuring a bomb in an airport and a hijacking, the release date was pushed back. Studio executives were assuredly shaking in their boots about what to do with this content, but their concerns were in vain — the content is actually pretty slick airport humor that goes by quickly. Instead, they should worry more about putting trailers for Lilo and Stitch, The Crocodile Hunter: Collision Course and The Country Bears before a film. The idea of a trailer is to get the audience excited about going to a theater, not excited about leaving it as soon as possible. Holy Moses.

The film itself bounces through the lives of some Miami residents that intersect with a suitcase containing a rebuilt Russian nuclear bomb. Several people end up seeking out the case for all sorts of different reasons, most of them not knowing that there is a weapon of mass destruction inside. Eliot Arnold (Tim Allen) is endorsed as the main character, but it's difficult to focus on one central personality — there are several intertwined interactions in the story and an ensemble cast huge enough to push the plot firmly into the backseat.

Big Trouble has enough different comedic devices to get by. It's like Old County Buffet, only tastier and better for you. The film admirably offers a little something for everyone: If you don't like hallucinatory toad humor or physical gags, there's bitter divorce-related sarcasm and subtle relationship interactions; you can also sample jokes about Geo Metros, grammar corrections and Florida Gator fans. There is plenty to go around — though like a buffet, it's hard to find anything that's really really good. The pieces are just OK, but, mysteriously, the cumulative effect sends you out of the theater thinking it was all pretty funny.

Credit the large cast: Allen, Rene Russo, Dennis Farina, Janeane Garafolo, Andy Richter, Jason Lee, Tom Sizemore, Johnny Knoxville and Patrick Warburton all make solid contributions to the film. None of them tries too hard, but they all manage to bring believable characterizations to the table, taking the sometimes-overbearing script in stride and just letting the scenes happen naturally. Watch out for Stanley Tucci, though. He's so terribly over-the-top in his role as a snobby construction magnate that Kenny Loggins is writing him his own theme song.

There's so much going on that, for the most part, the clichés (there are a few) and stale jokes (there are plenty) that made it into the film go largely unnoticed. Even with some serious suspension of disbelief issues, the film glides forward. Director Barry Sonnenfeld's pace is so quick that it really doesn't matter that a lot of its coincidences are wildly implausible or that some of the jokes and gags aren't funny — before you know it, you're on to another scene. Ultimately, it's Sonnenfeld's pace that makes this comedy work. It takes a pretty brilliant director to make 14 characters look good, let alone funny, and Sonnenfeld deserves praise for making it happen.

Still, it is this nebulous nature that ultimately hurts Big Trouble. Disney didn't advertise this film very hard, perhaps because it's difficult to sell something you can't define. It's not really about a single person, it's not really about a single relationship and by the time you think it's about anything at all, Sonnenfeld whisks you away to another scene. What makes the film funny also hinders the piece as a whole. That mysterious quality that surrounds the humor in the film seeps into everything about it — you can't understand why it's a funny film, and you can't understand why it's a mediocre film.

— Mark McConville (markwmcconville at hotmail dot com)