Charlie's Angels
*
Rated on a 4-star
scale
Screening venue: Warner Village (Birkenhead Conway Park)
Released in the UK by Columbia TriStar on November 24, 2000; certificate
15; 99 minutes; country of origin USA; aspect ratio 1.85:1
Directed by McG; produced by Drew
Barrymore, Leonard Goldber, Nancy Juvonen.
Written by John August, Ryan Rowe, Ed Solomon; based
on the TV show created by Ivan Goff, Ben Roberts.
Photographed by Russell Carpenter; edited by Peter Teschner;
Wayne Wahrman.
CAST.....
Cameron Diaz..... Natalie Cook
Drew Barrymore..... Dylan Sanders
Lucy Liu..... Alex Munday
Bill Murray..... Bosley
Tim Curry..... Roger Corwin
Kelly Lynch..... Vivian Wood
Crispin Glover..... The Thin Man
John Forsyth..... Charlie
"Charlie's Angels" has the same
effect as a bad comedian mumbling in his sleep. The difference is that it's
much more hyperactive. It strains to be funny with unwelcome forced cheese
that instantly hits the floor, in the midst of inappropriate music and
nonsensical movements by the actors that launch themselves upon us through
rapid fire cuts and gaudily bright photography. One critic I like has suggested
you could take any thirty seconds at random and use it as the trailer --
true enough, although it wouldn't attract much of an audience.
The film is based on the famous 1970s TV show
starring Jaclyn Smith, Farrah Fawcett and Cheryl Ladd, about a sexy group
of ex-policewomen who work as secret agents for a mysterious guy named Charlie.
Charlie never appears onscreen -- he's a voice on the phone, represented
in person by a quietly witty associate named Bosley. I was no huge fan of
the programme, but do concede it was fairly entertaining pulp fiction about
crime-fighting adventures; not quite on the level of "Columbo" or "Starsky
& Hutch", but more entertaining than "The Million Dollar Man" and certainly
easier on the eyes than "Kojak". (That I know the names of all these shows,
and reference them without explanation, is partly proof that I know what
I'm talking about, also a sign of misspent youth.)
What the makers of this new "Charlie's Angels"
don't understand is that the source material's reputation as over-the-top
comes from the icon status of its stars and the period fashions they wore.
Its content was hardly more ludicrous than any other show of its genre. The
director of this piece, credited only as 'McG', has done his best to wink
at the audience with so-bad-it's-good material, but he makes it so obvious
that it's just bad. He wants us to get a sensation of guilty pleasure, but
we can't, because we know the movie's shoddiness isn't sincere. A parade
of bad jokes serves no purpose when they're knowingly bad, because there's
nothing left for us to mock; all that's left is the form of a satire without
the target.
Examples: In one early scene, the angels (played
by Drew Barrymore, Cameron Diaz and Lucy Liu) sit eating home-baked cookies
that turn out to be rock hard. One of them shatters on a table, one gets
thrown at the door and penetrates it like a knife. Ho ho ho. In many moments,
the girls fight off attacks by making ridiculous slow-motion karate moves
in overwrought, awkward poses and floating up into the air as if they had
supernatural powers. They have repetitive 'zany' traits, such as the way
Diaz makes everything sound like a double-entendre. And the special effects
are intended to look cheap -- every time one is required, there is an obvious
jump cut or transition. All I want to know is, what makes this funny? What's
so good about being deliberately tacky? If it's parody, what's it trying
to send up?
It's easy to sit musing on the nonsensicality
of it all. In one scene Diaz does back-flips to avoid a floor heat sensor
when she could get around it just as easily by tiptoeing real quick. The
Charlie character has dossiers on everyone and everything, except for the
one guy who happens to be working against him. The angels have been specially
chosen as an elite force, and yet their combined brainpower would not be
strong enough to rise to the challenge of using a can opener. But this is
all beside the point -- an idiotic screenplay would have been amusing, would
have achieved the tone the filmmakers were hoping for, if everyone onscreen
didn't look like they were in on the joke.
I am, after all, human, and "Charlie's Angels"
does earn one star out of four for its costume design, which does its best
to show the leads in a sexually appealing light. One has to restrain oneself
from drooling when Diaz dances in her underwear, or tells a mailman "You
can just stick things in my slot", or when Barrymore lies naked in bed --
yeah, she's covered up, but a naked shoulder sets the imagination racing.
Lucy Liu is a weak link, though -- she's too skinny, with a dead tone of
voice, and eyes appear to have been lifted from a stoned frog; plus she carries
baggage from her irritating work in "Ally McBeal", quite possibly the worst
television show in history.
"Charlie's Angels" has not been received as badly
as expected; people have been pretty much split down the middle between those
who stare at it in appalled silence and those who find it a guilty pleasure.
Folks who fall into the latter category clearly need their jokes rammed down
their throats; for truly entertaining garbage, I'd recommend "Chill Factor"
and "Coyote Ugly", which have such brave purity and consistency to their
lack of quality that they are trashy and entertaining at the same time. My
companion swore she liked this flick. I think she was just amused by the
way it made me cringe.
COPYRIGHT© 2000 Ian
Waldron-Mantgani
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