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The Movie: There are bad movies and then there are really bad movies. Usually I try to go into a movie without any preconceived notions about what others think. Good reviews, bad reviews nothing phases me. If I'm interested in seeing something I go see it sometimes against the better judgement of others. In the case of Corky Romano I was simply wondering could the movie be as bad as people were making it out to be. The answer is a resounding yes, it's that bad. I'm not sure what the studio executives were thinking when they green lighted this project for Chris Kattan who up until now is best known as Mr Peepers and Mango on "Saturday Night Live". Kattan is just another in the long line of SNL members trying to make a big screen career for himself. Guess what Chris, Your not leading comedy star material because the majority of the time your just not funny. It's been a few years since his last high profile picture "A Night at the Roxbury" came out and Touchstone Pictures and Buena Vista hope that people have forgotten what a colossal failure that film was. Now Chris tries to take on the FBI from the inside in Director Rob Pritt's comedy "Corky Romano". The poster for this movie asks "Who is Corky Romano". Well Corky Romano (Chris Kattan) is a fun loving, good natured, klutz of a guy who loves animals. He's an assistant vet at a local animal clinic and is well liked by his patients owners. He's always happy and enjoys singing along to 80's songs in his nice sports car. The thing is he is the polar opposite of the rest of his family. The Romano crime family is lead by Pops Romano (Peter Falk) and the major players are Uncle Leo Corrigan (Fred Ward) and Corky's brothers played by Peter Berg and Chris Penn. Corky is estranged from the family as he doesn't really fit the mobster profile. There's a problem though as the family learns that the FBI have enough substantial evidence to put Pops away for a long time. Pop's is sure the only way they could have gotten enough information for a conviction is if they had an inside man. His solution is to put his own inside man at the FBI to destroy the evidence and thus the case. Thing is all of his associates are known and are already under surveillance. The only solution is to call upon Corky. Corky being the bumbling idiot that he is doesn't look like the typical bureau type and as such the family set's him up with a pretty impressive forged resume. The resume enables him to get in the door and he finds himself automatically assigned to the station director Howard Schuster (Shaft's Richard Roundtree) special "Night Vulture" task force. You would think the jig would be up after his first field assignment goes south but that doesn't happen because even after he appears to botch things in the end everything works out in his favor. While at the FBI, Corky also meets and falls in love with Agent Russo (Vinessa Shaw), befriends two other agents and becomes the director's favorite agent. It's not all fun and games though as one agent thinks Corky is a fraud and tries to expose him. Will Corky be exposed, will he destroy the file on his father and will he fall in love? It's hard to choose where to begin here in the critical comments section of the review. After a few minutes of deliberating I felt I'd start off with the fact that I almost walked out. Even considering walking out of a movie says a lot about my feelings towards a film. I'm a big movie fan and when something is so bad that it causes me to want to leave it's a rare occurance. The only times I've considered walking out in recent memory was during "Bless the Child" and "Lucky Numbers" two films that I had free sneak preview passes. If I didn't pay for the tickets and I considered leaving then that's pretty bad. However I'm an optimist and I like to think things will get better so I usually stick around. That and I hate not knowing how something ends. Call me crazy but since I slammed down good money for the ticket and popcorn I was determined to stay to the bitter end of Corky. Looking back I should have cut my losses as my time is worth more then that movie could ever be. Corky Romano is a take off on the popular Mafia genre that has been revitalized in recent years by the HBO TV series "The Sopranos". This is clear even by looking at the title; Romano, Soprano.. that's pretty close. The problem is that unlike the excellent TV drama Romano has nothing new to offer. It's a series of non funny gags many of which are very painful to watch. It's also a pretty offensive movie for it's PG-13 rating. All the jokes are stereotypical and make fun of people who can't read or who live alternative lifestyles. The situations Corky goes through are there only to stretch things so it's long enough to be a feature film. First time director Rob Pritt's falls back on situation based humor that not only isn't funny but is also insulting to anyone over the age of 2. If you can look past star Chris Kattan this movie actually has the makings to have been half decent. Had there been anything to work with at all in the script then the picture would have at least been improved by it's supporting cast. Peter Falk best known as TV's "Columbo" plays Pops Romano with a bit of humor and a bit of seriousness but it's easy to see that he's well passed his prime. Peter Berg whose has directed a film or two is good as Pauly one of the thug brothers and does provide a small amount of humor. Chris Penn whose role as Stiffler's dad in "American Pie 2" ended up on the cutting room floor has very little to do but sit and look menacing. Vinessa Shaw an actress I thought showed some promise in the late Stanley Kubrick's "Eyes Wide Shut" is around just to add some eye candy for the older teen males in the audience. Her female FBI agent seems pretty aggressive. Her presence on the screen helped albeit it ever so slightly to distract me from the plot. The original Shaft Richard Roundtree shows up here as a the director of the local FBI office. I can't imagine what he and Falk were thinking agreeing to appear in this movie. Are they that hard up for money and exposure that they need to lower their standards as to appear in a Chris Kattan movie. Now as for Chris Kattan someone should inform him that aside from a very few characters he does on Saturday Night Live that he isn't really that funny. His turn in the dreadful Brendan Fraser movie "Monkeybone" wasn't funny nor was the 90 minute version of his Butabi brother sketch. I think his best character so far is Asreal Abyss on SNL's Goth Talk. I don't know why they don't bring back that skit. At least I could stand that one. His Mister Peepers and Mango skits are downright lame as is performance here. Also appearing in a cameo role is "The Sopranos" Vincent Pastore. First time director Rob Pritts works off a screenplay by novice comedy writers David Garret and Jason Ward. The fact that most of the creative staff is new to the medium doesn't really surprise me as it really does show. If director Pritts did only one thing right is that he kept this movie as short as humanly possible as it clocks in at a mere 82 minutes. Despite all the pain and suffering I went through the first hour did seem to go by pretty quickly even if I wasn't laughing. A prerequisite for a comedy is that the audience is supposed to laugh and Pritt's didn't manage that simple task. This film has very few things to laugh at and the things I did find mildly amusing only caused a sort of half smile on my face. I don't expect Pritts to be at the helm of another project any time soon - if at all. Corky Romano is one of the lamest and most pathetic attempts at a comedy I've seen in a long period. I've seen many dumb comedies but this one takes the cake. The best part of this movie was when it ended. The characters are weak, the story is non existent and it's contains the fewest laugh worthy jokes on record. If for some reason your compelled to see this then I hope that after reading this you decide to skip it. I really should have walked out. This is one movie that I won't be revisiting when it hit's DVD. A downright awful comedy (if you still call it that) that is by far one of the years worst pictures. Rating : 3/10 Reviewed October 16 by Mark McLeod |