Subject: Review: Space Jam (1996)

From: [email-masked] (Chad Polenz)
Date: 7 Jul 1997 04:30:53 GMT

Space Jam
Chad'z rating: *** (out of 4 = good)
1996, PG, 81 minutes [1 hour, 21 minutes]
[comedy]
starring: Michael Jordan (himself), Billy West (voice of Bugs Bunny, Elmer
Fudd), Dee Bradley Baker (voice of Daffy Duck, Tazmanian Devil), Wayne Knight
(Stan Podolak), written by Leonardo Benvenuti, Timothy Harris, Steve Rudnick,
Herschel Weingrod, produced by Daniel Goldberg, Steven Paul Leiva, Ivan
Reitman, directed by Joe Pytka.

"Space Jam" is like a short movie they incorporate with thrill rides at big
amusement parks: it's not big on plot and is really just a long
advertisement. However, this film is funny and enjoyable and I can respect
that.

The Looney Toons characters (Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Porky Pig, etc.) have
entertained us in the form of animated shorts for years, and this film proves
their gags and routines can still work in the form of feature films. We seem
to have forgotten cartoons were designed to make us laugh (not to be overly
dramatic musicals), and this film not only re-establishes that concept, but
does it through an original, humorous manner. 

On the planet Moron Mountain (now there's a cartoon name if I ever heard
one!), a fat, greedy, cigar-smoking alien (voiced by Danny DeVito), who runs
a fledging amusement park, sends five scouts to Earth to kidnap the Looney
Tunes characters to enslave them as novelty acts for his show. 

Back on the "real" Earth, former basketball star Michael Jordan is
struggling with his baseball career and finds himself annoyed by his new
bumbling assistant Stan (Knight, the only fictional real-life character in
the film). The initial atmosphere is a bit choppy as Jordan is upstaged by
the professionalism of Knight and Bill Murray (as himself), but he isn't bad
and I couldn't help but be curious.

The five-inch tall aliens arrive in the land of the Looney Toons packing
powerful weapons and attempt to kidnap the 'toons. Using cartoon logic, Bugs
Bunny (voiced by West) convinces them the only way they can be kidnapped is
if they beat them in a game of basketball. So the aliens make their way to
the "real" world and steal the talents from some top NBA players (through
some very funny scenes), which causes them to morph into gigantic monsters.
So Bugs travels to the "real" world and brings back Michael Jordan, hoping he
can help them win.

An interesting subplot begins to develop regarding the players (Charles
Barkley, Shawn Kemp, Mugsy Bouges, Patrick Ewing, and Larry Johnson) who were
robbed of their talents and essentially become zombies. We get some slapstick
jokes, but it keeps with the cartoony nature of the film. When the players go
to strange means to get their talents back, the comedy works in both a
childish and mature manner: childish in the delivery, but mature in the witty
content. Throughout the film are  parodies children wouldn't understand, but
are still good anyway (including a hilarious "Pulp Fiction" spoof).

Describing the final act would be pointless wouldn't it? It's as cliche and
cartoony as they come, but I didn't mind.

"Space Jam" isn't anything genius, but it's a good, decent movie. Mixing
animation with live action is a difficult process to synthesize, especially
when the comedy is cartoony in nature (and using people who aren't really
actors), but this film has a lot of wit and cleverness that more than makes
up for its rough edges. 

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(C)1997 Chad Polenz