Little Tony DeFranco
03-26-2004, 06:33 PM
The Cohen Bros are doing all they can to make a commercial film (Intolerable Cruelty missed it) and "The Ladykillers" is as close as can be with Tom Hanks leading the charge, but it's still not the best they ever did. Sure it's a funny remake of a British 1955 film starring Alec Guinness, but the plot and story is worn, as the gags (The Cohen Bros. share the directors seat and the script). The story of a small group of loser crooks using a boarding house (with the title lady landlord) to pull a heist and have trouble doing it. Woody Allen's 'Small Time Crooks' did a fairly entertaining version, and Danny DeVito directed two similar films (Throw Momma-Duplex). This "Ladykillers" is on the same level, black humor and broad slapstick (maybe it should have been more broad).
Hanks is doing a character this time, Prof. Goathwaite H. Dorr PHD is a cross between Foghorne Leghorn and Headly Lamar (Blazing Saddles), a pretensions fake with a large vocabulary (nobody knows what he is saying) but slicker than snot on a doorknob. Irma P. Hall is Mrs. Munson the landlady doing a role he does perfectly, church loving, hip-hop hating, backhand bitchslappin Mississippi black momma (she did the same role in Martin Lawrence's "Money for Nothin"). Marlon Wayons walk in off a Wayons Bro. movie as one of the crooks. The best role goes to JK Simmons(Spiderman) as Garth Pancake, demolitions man on the team (fair to say he is liberal that is very self centered and has Irritable Bowel Syndrome).
The soundtrack has some great rippin gospel songs (T Bone Burnett again) but the problem is that it is not part of the storyline (like in 'O Brother Thou Art') , which would have made the movie funnier. Hanks is very good but it's a little taxing after a while, Bruce Campbell alert. Not the best but it is good enough.
http://www.browntownjohnny.com/index.php
Heartbeat is a Love Beat
Hanks is doing a character this time, Prof. Goathwaite H. Dorr PHD is a cross between Foghorne Leghorn and Headly Lamar (Blazing Saddles), a pretensions fake with a large vocabulary (nobody knows what he is saying) but slicker than snot on a doorknob. Irma P. Hall is Mrs. Munson the landlady doing a role he does perfectly, church loving, hip-hop hating, backhand bitchslappin Mississippi black momma (she did the same role in Martin Lawrence's "Money for Nothin"). Marlon Wayons walk in off a Wayons Bro. movie as one of the crooks. The best role goes to JK Simmons(Spiderman) as Garth Pancake, demolitions man on the team (fair to say he is liberal that is very self centered and has Irritable Bowel Syndrome).
The soundtrack has some great rippin gospel songs (T Bone Burnett again) but the problem is that it is not part of the storyline (like in 'O Brother Thou Art') , which would have made the movie funnier. Hanks is very good but it's a little taxing after a while, Bruce Campbell alert. Not the best but it is good enough.
http://www.browntownjohnny.com/index.php
Heartbeat is a Love Beat