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Rating: 4.5 stars

All movies seen on 03/29/2002

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Death to Smoochy (2002)

Directed by Danny DeVito

Comedy

Most recently watched by sleestakk, sensoria

Overview

Tells the story of Rainbow Randolph, the corrupt, costumed star of a popular children’s TV show, who is fired over a bribery scandal and replaced by squeaky-clean Smoochy, a puffy fuchsia rhinoceros. As Smoochy catapults to fame - scoring hit ratings and the affections of a network executive - Randolph makes the unsuspecting rhino the target of his numerous outrageous attempts to exact revenge and reclaim his status as America’s sweetheart.

Rated R | Length 109 minutes

Actors

Robin Williams | Edward Norton | Catherine Keener | Danny DeVito | Jon Stewart | Pam Ferris | Danny Woodburn | Michael Rispoli | Harvey Fierstein | Vincent Schiavelli | Craig Eldridge | Judy White | Tim MacMenamin | Bruce McFee | Glen Cross | Bill Lake | Nick Taylor | Richard Cocchiaro | Tracey Walter | Louis Giambalvo | Colin Moult | Nikolai Tichtchenko | Martin Klebba | Tonya Reneé Banks | Christy McGinity Gibel | Philip Craig | Natasha Kinne | Richard Hamilton | Shawn Byfield | Todd Graff | Melissa DiMarco | Dan Duran | Michael Copeman | James Carroll | Phillip Jarrett | Suzanne Leonard Feliz | Thomas Lyons | Angela Bullock | Robert M. Sussman | George Blumenthal | Matthew Arkin | Hugo Jansuzian | Silvia Rojas | Mario Andres Torre | Sabrina Jansuzian | John 'Cha Cha' Ciarcia | Fred Scialla | Adam Bryant | Richard Ziman | Frank Anello | Samantha Cordero | Peter Keleghan | Rothaford Gray | David Brown | Gerry Quigley | James Binkley | Dylan Roberts | Vito Rezza | Lou Cantres | John Cleland | Lauren Flanigan | Cara Wakelin | Ted Kavouris | Tony Ashmore | Ty Copeman | Antonio Cordero | Jonah Falcon | Frank Falcone | Katie Finneran | Edie Inksetter | Greg Korin | Peter Kosaka | Danny LeGare | Richard D. Leko | Peter Loung | Robert Mauzell | Felicia Peluso | Martin Pfefferkorn | Robert Prosky

Viewing History (seen 1 time)

Viewing Notes

This review originally appeared on ZENtertainment.com. It had received 804 hits as of the last snapshot as of November 28, 2003.

SMOOCHY is dark and dark comedies are not always well received or well understood. The genre has to find a certain audience, as not everyone can laugh about death and generally dark subject matter. That being said, SMOOCHY is absolutely filled with hilarious moments. While the writers occasionally dip into low-brow humor, most of it stays above par and largely hilarious. Do not judge SMOOCHY by the first half-hour; it picks up quickly after that.

Robin Williams has stereotypically been, at least in the limelight, a lighthearted comedian. Most people haven’t seen Williams’ dark side since MORK & MINDY. In SMOOCHY, Williams was not himself, to say the least. As usual, Williams was charismatically over-the-top, but this time his character was filled to the brim with profanity and hate. He is, frankly, a little bit annoying at times. Thankfully Williams mostly stays away from his trademark voices that so infect his other movies. Catherine Keener and Jon Stewart were passable as Nora and Stokes, respectively, but almost any actors could have played the parts. Ed Norton pulls off the sappy and happy go-lucky kid’s show host easily and at the same time hints at a dark side of Sheldon Mopes’ personality that is unfortunately never really explored. At times he plays the character as seemingly right on the edge of either anger or insanity. One only need to look at the casting of Norton to know that the film has a great script. From PRIMAL FEAR to AMERICAN HISTORY X, Norton hasn’t made a bad film yet.

At times, however, the film feels like it’s scatter shooting a bit and while it knows where to end, it doesn’t know how to get there. DeVito also makes use of odd and unnecessary camera angles, as in a conspiratorial scene between his character Burke and the Parade of Hope boss Merv Green (Harvey Fierstein). Randolph also makes an emotional left turn at one point that, at least in speed, is completely illogical.

Nonetheless, Adam Resnick has managed to make up for those deficiencies with more laughs. Keep your ears open for Smoochy’s song, “Stepdad Stan.”

This film falls in my top five films for 2002 so far. Demented and dark humor films like this are rarely produced and even more rarely successful in covering all the bases. DEATH TO SMOOCHY is dark, demented, hilarious and it is a film that no one should miss.

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