The Blues Brothers 2000 (DVD)

As a huge fan of the original "Blues Brothers" film, my heart sank when I heard they were planning on updating it. After all, remakes of classic films rarely go well, with the likes of "Alfie" and "The Italian Job" not faring too well in recent years. Admittedly, this was to be more of an updated version, possibly a tribute film in many ways, featuring many of the original cast, but the original was such a fun film, ...
...is nearly twenty years from the last show, which began with Jake being released from prison and ended with the whole band in jail. This time it is Elwood who is just getting out of prison, this time to discover he is all alone, with his brother and his father figure having died whilst he was incarcerated. As before, his first thought is to visit the nun who raised him and this results in him wanting to put the band back together.

As ... more

As a huge fan of the original "Blues Brothers" film, my heart sank when I heard they were planning on updating it. After all, remakes of classic films rarely go well, with the likes of "Alfie" and "The Italian Job" not faring too well in recent years. Admittedly, this was to be more of an updated version, possibly a tribute film in many ways, featuring many of the original cast, but the original was such a fun film, could that feeling be replicated, or was it a one off?

It is nearly twenty years from the last show, which began with Jake being released from prison and ended with the whole band in jail. This time it is Elwood who is just getting out of prison, this time to discover he is all alone, with his brother and his father figure having died whilst he was incarcerated. As before, his first thought is to visit the nun who raised him and this results in him wanting to put the band back together.

As is Elwood's way, it isn't long before he has managed to be accused of kidnapping a ten year old boy, had his drummer's club burnt down and offended the Russian mafia and called into question the parentage of the Commander of the Illinois State Police. Of course, he's also managed to get the band back together and found someone to replace Jake as his co-lead singer. Now all that remains for the newly reformed Blues Brothers to do is travel through several states, from Chicago down to the deep South of Louisiana, avoiding all those who want to arrest and kill them - or both - and play a couple of shows. It may not be simple, but with a Blues Brothers film, you know it's likely to be pretty silly and a whole lot of fun!

As with the original, the cast reads like a "Who's Who" of rhythm and blues. There are appearances and performances from the likes of Aretha Franklin, James Brown, Wilson Pickett, B. B. King, Eric Clapton and Bo Diddley, amongst others. If none of these names are familiar, then this probably isn't the film for you. As before, the Blues Brothers Band are back in their entirety, with the exception of Cab Calloway and John Belushi, who had passed away between the two films.

This gives the film a definite sequel feel, although with nearly twenty years between the two films it is tough to term it as such. It is interesting to see how the characters have aged, as very few of them have changed all that much. In both looks and personality, all the band members are recognisable and many of them have similar jobs to be prised away from this time as in the original film.

Also as with the first time around, a lot of the musicians in particular seem to be having a good time filming their roles, as if they're simply delighted to be in such company as the Blues Brothers. Admittedly, they're not called upon to stretch themselves, with their roles largely involving doing what they normally do and it is really only Aretha Franklin and B. B. King who are asked to do any acting at all and even then, only a little.

Amongst the main characters, Joe Morton as Cabel Chamberlain performs adequately, but actually seems much happier as a policeman than he does as a Blues Brother. J. Evan Bonifant, as the youngest band member, also puts in a decent performance and goes the other way from Morton, seeming to relax a lot more when he's given the dark glasses to wear and although his singing is the weakest of the four, his dancing is certainly the best. John Goodman always had a tough role to replace John Belushi as Elwood's main partner, Mac McTeer, and he looks as if it's weighing heavy on his shoulders, as he never seems completely at ease. The same is true of Dan Ackroyd as Elwood himself, who doesn't seem quite as happy bouncing off Goodman as he did off Belushi and seems even more uptight than his character seems to suggest he should be.

All the ingredients that made the original "Blues Brothers" such a classic are here again. There is some wonderful music, with soul and blues featured quite heavily and a very over the top car crash. There are chases galore, a religious conversion and some really silly situations that very few people other than the Blues Brothers could get themselves into, much less out of. So, in theory, this should at least be the equal of the original film.

Unfortunately, that's not the case, as they have clearly tried too hard with this one. They've tried to go that one step further and do everything bigger and better than the first time and have only partially succeeded. They've managed to do most things bigger, but not necessarily better.

A prime example of this is in the use of some of the special effects. In the first film, there was really very little need of these, apart from some of the sillier moments involving a couple of the cars and even then, they seemed to be deliberately done badly to keep with the kind of messy charm of the film. This time, you can tell that more effort has been put in to making them look better, but it's been so badly done, they just looks amateurish at times. Certainly the "conversion" of Cabel Chamberlain particularly grates in its awfulness.

The same is true of the music. This time, the film is more of a musical than before and with more singing stars needing their share of the limelight, there are a lot more songs than before. But whereas the original was a car chase with songs, "Blues Brothers 2000" is more of a musical with a car chase. This means that some of the things that characterise a musical happen here, with characters breaking into song out of nowhere and the way others are introduced seems quite flimsy. The Wilson Pickett number is an example of the former and Blues Traveler, whilst delivering an excellent song, have their appearance treated very much like a pop video and the apparent excuse for their appearance is so badly done that it feels as if they were shoehorned in late in the day.

This is likely to put off existing fans, as they have taken away a lot of the easy going charm that made the original "Blues Brothers" so much fun. It is also likely to alienate potential new fans as, apart from the music, everything else is verging on the ridiculous and it's clear this film is a sequel, or at least a tribute, to something else, which means that if you've not seen that something else, you're going to be a step behind right from the start.

For both sets of fans, this is a difficult film to get hold of, especially on its own. The Amazon Marketplace has copies available from £5.97 and eBay from £8.00 and copies on video do also occasionally surface. For those who are like me and a huge fan of the original "Blues Brothers", the new 4 DVD "Blues Brothers Collection" for around £17.00 from Amazon and Sendit.com would be far more to your liking, with this film likely to be the lesser of 4 DVDs, but with 3 others to balance out how bad this one can be.
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