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Blues Brothers 2000
**
Cinema
Releases - May 22,
1998
Rated on a 4-star
scale; USA; Directed by John Landis. Written by John Landis and Dan Aykroyd;
based on the 1980 film "The Blues Brothers", written by Landis and Aykroyd.
Starring Dan Aykroyd, John Goodman, Joe Morton, J. Even Bonifant, Frank Oz,
Kathleen Freeman, B.B. King, Aretha Franklin.
I don't know a soul who wants one, but can there
even be a Blues Brothers film for the 90s? In the original 1980 film,
when Elwood Blues (Dan Aykroyd) got out of jail to resurrect the blues band
of himself and his brother Jake (John Belushi), their image was cool and
energetic. Would any people today consider it so interesting to see a replication
of the same manner of dressing, acting and singing? There's nothing wrong
with it, but then there's nothing wrong with skateboards either, is
there?
John Landis's "Blues Brothers 2000",
or "BB2K" for short, does not even think about this, and ignores any question
of a culture clash, which makes for a very strange film. Dan Aykroyd, having
lost weight and being made up to look just as he did in 1980, doesn't seem
right in a film which foolishly uses 90s techniques and settings, and most
egregiously, a 90s look.
At one point Elwood tells his band that if they
abandon him, they'll leave future generations with only "recycled,
digitally-sampled techno grooves, quasi-synth rhymths, pseudo-songs of
violence-laden gangster rap... acid, pop and saccharine, simpering, soulless
slush". The sad truth is that that kind of crap has already taken over the
kinds of crowds Elwood wants to win over. He sticks out as much as Austin
in "Austin Powers", or Napoleon in "Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure".
Except those films got the joke, and used it.
Yeah, jokes. Those funny things that, you know,
make people laugh. "BB2K" could do with a few more of them. The film has
some terrible moments, as early as the slow and embarrassing first scene,
in which Elwood waits outside jail all night for his brother, before being
told he's dead. Then we Elwood visits Mother Mary Stigmata (Kathleen Freeman),
the nun who took him in as a child, who whips him for no plausible reason
except his lack of confidence. In the original film, Jake and Elwood were
whipped by Sister Mary for their foul language, which led to continual whipping
as they reacted to each whip with a cuss word. It was a great scene because
of how farcical it became; the filmmakers of "BB2K" seem to think that the
whipping itself was the funny part. Similarly, there is a five-minute car
pileup, and they think that the more cars they can get to crash, the funnier
the scene will be; the first film gave us a clever chase populated by colourful
characters with imaginative ways of bumbling their driving.
Granted, there are a few wonderful scenes too,
like the way Aykroyd wins back former band member Mr. Fabulous (Alan
Rubin) by disrupting a funeral, and Joe Morton is superb as the long lost
son of Curtis, a character from the first film who was played by the late
Cab Calloway. One spectacular moment sees the Holy Spirit turn Morton into
a Blues Brother in the middle of a church.
But good or bad, everything bar the musical numbers
is stolen from the original film, and comes across as desperately lacklustre
-- "recycled saccharine slush", to use Elwood's own words. "The Blues Brothers"
was filled with moody images and wonderful comic timing. Here, even the music
doesn't have the power it needs to, because it doesn't work into the rest
of the film; the songs are not an extension of a spirit of crazy joy, they're
obligatory filler. It's fun to see how B.B. King, James Brown and Aretha
Franklin are getting on nowadays, and the updates of their cameo roles are
amusing, like seeing eccentric old friends. I'm not unhappy to have seen
the film, but at 121 minutes, it's too long not to get somewhat sour about.
Dedicated to Belushi, Calloway and John Candy, who have all passed on since
featuring in the original movie, it may not be a work they would have
been proud of, but thankfully it's not shameful either.
COPYRIGHT©
1998 Ian Waldron-Mantgani
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