Rakesh's movie talk
Big Trouble (2002)













Home | Movie Reviews | Movie talk | Film Personalities | Misc Articles | Contact Me | Tamil Time





Directed by Barry Sonnenfield
Written by Robert Ramsey and Matthew Stone
Starring: Tim Allen, Rene Russo, Stanley Tucci, Omar Epps, Dennis Farina, Ben Foster, Janeane Garofalo, Jason Lee, Tom Sizemore, Zooey Deschanel, Johnny Knoxville, Heavy D, Sofía Vergara, Patrick Warburton
















 

If there are some of you who don't know Dave Barry, I feel sorry for you. He is perhaps the funniest columnist I know. I have a few of his collection of columns in book form and I devour it now and then to sharpen my own sense of humour, whatever there is.

You see, Barry wrote a novel called Big Trouble. I refused to read it, knowing very well, that by putting his own inimitable style of prose writing into narrative format, something may get lost. Probably I was wrong, when I saw the movie version of that book.

Big Trouble the movie is definitely very, very funny. It has a great ensemble cast. The director, Sonnenfield, directed Get Shorty and Men In Black, two movies I enjoyed immensely. What more could you ask?

Here, Tim Allen plays an ex-columnist from Miami Heralds (shades of Barry himself) who has a bad relationship with his son. Now, the rest of the story deals in how he gets entangled with a shady white collar criminal (Tucci), his wife (Russo), a couple of bumbling convicts (Sizemore and Knoxville), mafia hit-men (Farina and Kehler), FBI men (Omar Epps and Heavy D), a hobo who lives on tree and Fritos, Puggy, a dog that likes to sniff crotches and a toad that spits hallucinogenic stuff. Wait, there is also this flying goat. Or was it a stunt goat?

All this takes place in Miami, Barry's home. It strips down all the glory of that state and gives the mafia hit-men all the reason to leave the place as soon as they can. There are shades of Get Shorty here. There are definitely shades of Elmore Leonard, whose books like the abovementioned Get Shorty, and others like 52 Pick-Up, Out of Sight, and Jackie Brown are mostly crime stories with strong sense of humour in them. Well, this film is Elmore Leonard, Tarantino and Mel Brooks all meshed together.

I loved this movie and will definitely get hold of its video. I had no trouble with the cast and I definitely have no trouble with the script. You don't need much thinking to appreciate the humour and the actors have no reason to be despicable to be funny like in many other movies. Get the hang of it. You will love this movie.

bigtrouble.jpg