“The Man”
New Line Cinema
Directed by Les Mayfield
Written by Jim Piddock,
Margaret Oberman and Steve Carpenter
Starring: Samuel L. Jackson, Eugene Levy, Miguel Ferrer and Luke Goss
Rated PG-13
83 minutes
Opened September 9, 2005
One half out of four stars
“The Man” might have been an original concept, if only “Lethal Weapon,” “Rush Hour,” “48 Hours,” “Midnight Run,” “Men in Black,” “The Sting,” “Some Like it Hot,” “White Men Can’t Jump,” “Lethal Weapon 2,” “Starsky and Hutch,” “Die Hard with a Vengeance,” “Bad Boys,” “Rush Hour 2,” “The Blues Brothers,” “Lethal Weapon 3,” “Men in Black 2,” “Shanghai Noon,” “Shanghai Knights,” “Another 48 Hours,” “Bandits,” “The Rundown,” “Bad Boys 2,” “Dumb and Dumber,” “Tommy Boy,” “Planes, Trains and Automobiles,” “Twins,” “Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle,” “Tango and Cash,” “Bad Company,” “I Spy,” “Taxi,” “Amos and Andrew,” “National Security,” “Hollywood Homicide” and “Lethal Weapon 4” hadn’t all thought of it first.
Yes, it’s the Buddy Movie, and as Buddy Movies go, this one’s about as flimsy as it gets. This time, the filmmakers came up with the completely radical new idea of pairing a hip, black dude with an unassuming, suburban white dude.
Samuel L. Jackson plays Special Agent Derrick Mann (Get it?) who is trying to set up a sting by purchasing some guns on the black market from a devilishly handsome, deeply tanned, not-at-all conspicuous foreign gun-runner with really great teeth (Luke Goss). Eugene Levy is Andy Fiddler, a dental supplies salesman who unwittingly becomes a part of a Grave Misunderstanding.
Jackson, or “The Man,” as the title might suggest, is supposed to meet the gun-runners in a coffee shop. His tip-off? He’ll be the guy eating the croissant and reading USA Today. Because it’s not like millions of people read USA Today or anything. Andy is mistaken for Derrick, and the rest of the movie focuses on their unlikely partnership. Hijinks ensue. Laughs do not.
I’ll just say this-Horatio Sanz is in this movie. That should tell you all you need to know. Oh yeah, and Eugene Levy farts a lot. Seriously, the geniuses that wrote “The Man” have come up with an exciting, visionary concept called Flatulence Humor. The constant farting is really a gas. Hey, that was a pun.
There is an old Saturday Night Live “Celebrity Jeopardy” sketch, in which Burt Reynolds (Norm MacDonald), suddenly puts on a bright yellow, oversized hat and walks in front of the camera. “Yeah, I found this backstage,” he says. “An oversized hat. It’s funny.” “No it’s not,” says Alex Trebek.
“Sure it is. It’s funny. It’s funny because it’s, ah, bigger than ah…you know, a normal hat. Funny.”
That pretty much sums up this movie. Director Les Mayfield (of “Encino Man” fame) thinks that just because he’s pairing Jackson with Levy, it’ll be funny. “It’s funny because it’s ah…you know, about a cool black guy and a nerdy white guy. Funny.” Well, it’s not funny. Or exciting. Or amusing in any way. This is a movie for very, very stupid 10-year-olds.