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| THE HONEYMOONERS (2005) | |
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“It’s alive!” The infamous words by Dr. Frankenstein could not even bring back a sitcom that has been dead for over a half a century.
However, director John Schultz gives his best effort to remake the sitcom from 1955 with a new adaptation into the theaters, as he casts Cedric the Entertainer and Mike Epps as his sidekick.
Together with these two comedians, Schultz tries to poke fun of the economical situation of a family, and their attempt to gain the American Dream in a swift and easy manner.
However, nothing is easy or swift, as it sets up a myriad of slapstick situations and silly humor.
The film begins to set up the story in New York in the fall of 1999, as Ralph Kramden (Cedric the Entertainer) drives a bus while displaying his dreaming persona. It also shows how he met his future wife Alice (Gabrielle Union) and his deficient skills in business through a Y2K survival kit. Six years later, Ralph is still a bad businessman and a bus driver who keeps dreaming of the big deal. However, his relationship with Alice is no longer as sweet, as it was when he met her for the first time. Now Ralph has to deal with the responsibilities of being married while he also secretively tries to juggle shady business deals in order to make quick money. However, whenever the truth catches up with him, and it usually does, Alice throws her wrath over him. Honeymooners’ storyline focuses on both Ralph and Alice, but also on their neighbors and friends Ed (Mike Epps) and Trixie (Regina Hall). Alice and Trixie have decided to buy a duplex before the entrepreneur William Davis (Eric Stoltz) buys the building, but in order to do that they have to have $20,000 within two weeks. This presents a problem to Ralph, as he has squandered some of their money on a supposedly get-rich-quick deal. It causes further problems for Ralph, as he and Ed begin to look for another quick deal. The dumb thing is that they do not understand when they have a good deal, and they do not know what good business is. When they are lucky to find a sure winner, even then they mess it up. The story is a sad mess moving in a predictable direction and the silly jokes do not make it any better. Sure, the audience will find opportunity to laugh, but so do people when a stranger tells a funny joke. In Honeymooners the story feels forced while even the performances feel like a bunch of bad skits put together in order to create something that looks like a storyline. With a budget of 27 million dollars, it should raise some questions such as why they green light the project, as it still requires a lot of rewriting and reworking. Maybe in another 50 years, a remake of Honeymooners (2005) will be available that they have been able to revitalize through a proper script that has some life in the story. |
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| J.S. Cardone | |
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USA |
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| REVIEWED | |
| BY KIM ANEHALL – 11/11/2005 | |
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The Internet Movie Database. |
