rating:
(out of
4 stars)United States; 2005
Directed by F. Gary Gray; produced by David Nicksay, Michael Shamberg, Stacey Sher; written by Peter Steinfeld
Starring John Travolta, Uma Thurman, Vince Vaughn, Cedric the Entertainer, André Benjamin, Steven Tyler, Christina Milian, Harvey Keitel, The Rock, Danny DeVito, James Woods, Wyclef Jean, Anna Nicole Smith, Fred Durst, Arielle Kebbel
Below you will find a temporary review for this film. The real (better, more complete) review will be online very soon.
The new promotion video for The Black Eyed Peace and especially Aerosmith is
called 'Be Cool', a sequel to the pretty cool 'Get Shorty'. This is one of
those sequels where close to nothing works simply because it has been done
earlier and better. 'Be Cool' knows it has been done earlier, but it thinks
it has the same magic. It refers to other movies and to itself as a sequel
and although it is a little fun sometimes, most of the time it is not.
Like 'Get Shorty' it stars John Travolta as Chili Palmer, a gangster who
went into the movie industry in the first film. Now he goes into the music
industry, not that special to begin with, together with the wife of his dead
friend. She happens to be Uma Thurman and so the 'Pulp Fiction' duo is
there. Especially the scenes with Travolta and Thurman that mirror scenes
from 'Pulp Fiction', there is a dance sequence to name one, fail completely.
Of course a film needs villains. Here we have a group of Russians, another
producer named Nick Carr (Harvey Keitel), with who Chili fights for a great
singer named Linda Moon (Christina Milian), Carr's helpers Raji (Vince
Vaughn) and Elliot Wilhelm (The Rock) and a group of rappers including Sin
LaSalle (Cedric the Entertainer) and Dabu (André Benjamin). The villains are
not what they could be either. Keitel, who had a cameo appearance in 'Get
Shorty', is one of his earlier characters only less interesting, Vaughn does
his best with a concept that is not funny to begin with (as a white guy he
thinks he is black) and The Rock has his moments although he also starts
with a concept that is not that funny (he is a gay bodyguard who wants to be
an actor). The rappers are handled as stereotypes, I guess that is the joke,
and only André Benjamin from Outkast delivers some nice moments.
Where 'Get Shorty' and other movies based on Elmore Leonard's novels like
'Jackie Brown' and 'Out of Sight' work, 'Be Cool' does not. You can call
Travolta cool here, but Travolta is always cool so that fact can not save a
movie anymore. When a movie wants to joke about the movie industry while
using the music industry (I have not even mentioned how The Black Eyed Peace
and Steven Tyler from Aerosmith enters the movie) it is fine, but it still
needs to tell a story with scenes that work, not simply copy and refer to
other ones. 'Be Cool' has very little scenes that work on their own.