Bowfinger (Wide Screen) > Reviews > It's Like Ed Wood...In Technicolour

Author's product rating:   

Did you enjoy it?	Liked it
Story	Outstanding
Characters / Performances	Good
Special Effects	Good
How does it compare to similar films?	Good

Advantages:	Funny
Disadvantages:	As good as it could have been?

Recommend to potential buyers:

yes

Full review

"Oh no, not a Steve Martin movie. But he used to be so funny and now he's become so UNfunny - come on brain, can't watch something else?". That was pretty much the thought that was going through my head when Bowfinger reared it's ugly head. Martin had had it, he was a has-been, and worse still came in the prospect of Eddie Murphy. Oh please, since knocking use senseless in Beverley Hills Cop, it had been pretty much downhill all the way (why are the words 'Pluto' and 'Nash' floating around my tiny mind at the moment?). Did this film have ANY redeeming qualities? Well, there's Heather Graham...Hmmm - Ok, that'll do.

Down on his luck director/producer Bobby Bowfinger is down to pretty much his last dollar when his accountant presents him with his pet screenplay, Chubby Rain. Totally blown away by the script, Bowfinger just knows that this is going to be a monster hit of a movie - one problem though: no cash. Without cash no-one will work with him and without a star no big time producer will even hear him out. Hmm, what to do, what to do. The hottest star in town is Kit Ramsey and if Bowfinger could just get HIM involved then no producer in their right mind would turn him down. The only problem with THAT is that Ramsey won't come within a million miles of Bowfinger and his two-bit operation. Well...just because Ramsey doesn't want to be in it doesn't mean that he won't be in it. With his rag tag band of film makers Bowfinger sets out to make a movie, a movie that it's leading star doesn't even know he's starring in...

Admittedly the premise for Bowfinger is intriguing - films about the side of Hollywood BEHIND the camera are always just that little bit different but... Oh it's got has been Steve Martin in it, it'll be awful. And you know what? It was. Actually it wasn't (that was a lie) (you work out which bit was true and which bit wasn't).

Bowfinger tries desperately hard to be a comedy and it manages it splendidly. The story has that slight spark of the zany that typified Martin's early work and while we're never in the same ballpark as The Jerk, Bowfinger does have moments of being...'out there'. Is this a bad thing? Not in the slightest as this is what makes the film work so well. Martin was always at his best when he was being desperately manic and here the entire film is built on his desperation (to make the film). Along the way he takes sideswipes at many aspects of the film industry and although the little things may pass many viewers by, they're there all the same.

The best comparison to make would be to compare Bowfinger with Tim Burton's Ed Wood as both films deal with failed directors and crazy schemes to make movies. Bowfinger is Wood in fiction form and transplanted to a more contemporary age. They do similar things, bend similar rules, and get into similar scrapes. They both have the same collection of freaks that they drag along with them and this is exactly what's needed. Martin and his band of idiots take on the system (in their own way) and manage to come out of it smelling of roses. The stupid things that they say and do highlight the supposedly 'sane' things that people say and do which when viewed subjectively make absolutely no sense at all. This is what Martin does well and this is partly why Bowfinger is such a success.

While Martin brings much to the film and he's more outrageous than we've seen him for a long time, he's still restrained compared to his early movies. This is a grown up Steve Martin who only allows the insane Steve Martin to peek through occasionally. It's a good performance none the less and, as always, Martin is a likeable chap who's just a bit down on his luck. Just as Martin was in need of a hit, so was Eddie Murphy and while Murphy may not be of the same style as Martin, he gets his chance here. Kit Ramsey is typical Murphy insomuch as he's loud, manic, and OTT. This is the type of character that Murphy appears to be himself and although it may annoy me, it is very well used in the film as a whole. And as is also typical of Murphy, one role is not enough. Also stepping into the shoes of geeky Jiff Ramsey (Kit's geek brother) Murphy manages to show two sides to his acting talents and while neither is really brilliant (Jiff is too exaggerated for my tastes) as a whole he's an asset to the film.

Heather Graham has fun as starlet Daisy and her transparent approach for reaching the top of the Hollywood tree is as hilarious as it is poignant. Far better than in Lost In Space, Graham has the kind of fun and energy that she showed in Austin Powers 2. Terence Stamp as Kit's psychic guru was one fly in the ointment but while Stamp himself was fine, the entire sub-story regarding Ramsey's obsession with his Scientology style cult felt as though it was simply one step too far. It slows down the movie a lot and while it sets up Ramsey's paranoia, it's one of the low points of the film.

Now a world away from being Yoda in the Star Wars movies, Frank Oz directs Bowfinger with a definite stab at Hollywood. He lets the film show the underbelly of the movie industry and has great fun doing it. The laughs flow and he makes the film poke fun at so many aspects of the movie machine. He's also clever enough to know when to cut his cast loose and it's clear that at times Martin and Murphy were effectively given carte blanche. Oz creates a great comedy that has a moral underneath it but unlike in many films, never turns down the laugh-o-meter as the film draws to it's conclusion (a problem in many films).

Bowfinger is a film that pretty much everyone can watch and laugh at. Yes some of the gags will fly over the heads of some while catching others square in the face, but it manages to work in many different styles. There's slapstick, sarcasm, wit, manic obsession, and down and out stupidity, but this mix means that it's appeal is much broader than if it had focused on just one style. It's a comedy that has an intelligence about it - it knows what it's poking fun at and does it have fun doing it.

If you enjoyed Ed Wood then Bowfinger will no doubt appeal, and if you didn't enjoy Ed Wood then there's much here that distances this from the Wood-meister. And if you've never seen Ed Wood? Well, err...watch it anyway - if only for Steve Martin pretending to be on a cell phone and the snapped cord popping out of his sleeve