THE ADVENTURES OF PLUTO NASH - REVIEW


Ever since Steve Martin's fun and clever Bowfinger, Eddie Murphy's career has suffered what can only be described as a suicide. Abysmal efforts like Daddy Day Care or Norbit underlining the once brilliant comedian's fleeting filmography.

In between all that was mega flop Pluto Nash: a film so cataclysmically unappealing that even the four people who saw it upon its release went home disappointed. But is the film worthy of such disinterest and critical hate?

Well, lets see: you've got a film with characters called Pluto Nash and Rex Crater set on a futuristic Moon with Randy Quaid as a robot... does that really sound like something you DON'T want to see? I, for one, couldn't wait to get into it!

And you know what?

It wasn't half bad!

Now don't get me wrong: it's hardly one of Murphy's best and I'm not about to fit it into my Top 100 comedies of the past decade but compared to all the other other Eddie Murphy films out since Bowfinger, this is pretty great! It's colourful, fun, creative, occasionally clever, entertainingly silly and definitely watchable.

It's something I can enjoy like I can enjoy the Super Mario Bros. movie: it's clearly aimed at kids but doesn't talk down to them and puts effort into creating a solid, good-looking, amusing little sci-fi story.

The best thing about the film is that Murphy plays it straight and doesn't go for an overly goofy persona or something loud, obnoxious and in a fat suit like we're now accustomed to (and tired of?). This isn't a towering achievement or anything but it's only really a victim of its own ambitions rather than a lack of overall quality.

So fear not, Pluto Nash is no Norbit or Meet Dave: yes it's way too expensive an idea for a silly kids' movie but the result is decent enough and I could probably name hundreds of kids' flicks way more annoying and rubbishy than this one.

A weirdly underrated, genuinely entertaining effort.

(Baby Geniuses, anyone? No, I didn't think so.)

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