WORLD TOUR Day 6 - Los Angeles, CA
BEFORE: I saw the first two films in this series back in the 1980's on the big screen, and somehow I never felt the urge to watch the third film. Sometimes you just get a feeling, you know? But I crossed James Dean films off the list last night, so tonight I do the same for Paul Hogan. Hey, at least he only made three films - we never had to see Crocodile Dundee Goes to Jail, Crocodile Dundee Goes to Camp, or Crocodile Dundee in Space.
I know I suspended actor linking for the duration of the tour, but I just had to check to see if it was possible tonight, and it is. Natalie Wood from "Rebel Without a Cause" was also in a film called "All the Fine Young Cannibals" with George Hamilton, who makes a cameo appearance tonight. Doesn't that beat all?
THE PLOT: Mick Dundee travels to the city of smog and stars with his young son in tow.
AFTER: OK, I admit it. I made up this world tour just to get this film off my list. Back to movies about bank heists tomorrow. Or maybe boxing films, or space aliens. Nope, I have to just eat crow with this one, it's a real bomb. Curse me for being a completist.
With some movies, you just get the feeling like no one in the production knows what they're doing. And sometimes you just get the feeling like no one in the production really cares, and I think that's worse. Apathy trumps ignorance every time. I can understand a movie that's really shoddily done if it's made by students, or foreigners, or someone who's never seen a film before - but here, there's no excuse. A lot of people involved here should have known better. Maybe Paul Hogan needed to make another film to keep his SAG membership active.
The fish-out-of water thing worked in the first "Crocodile Dundee" film, but 15 years and three films later, it doesn't seem like the character has learned a darn thing. If you liked the jokes in the first film about an Outback man carrying a knife in the big city, and encountering a transvestite, you're in luck, because those jokes get repeated here. Pretty much every joke from the first film gets referenced or repeated in some way, including the notion that Australians are all magical creatures, and all super-charming in their ignorance of our big-city ways.
But by moving the location to L.A., the filmmakers found they could shoot on the Paramount lot, merely by setting the film at, of all places, the Paramount lot. Lazy. Mick Dundee's girlfriend has to run an L.A. newspaper for a few months, and since the previous editor died in a completely explainable and not-at-all-suspicious accident, it's only logical that the last story he was working on was what caused him to be not-murdered. (Huh?) Honestly, it feels like the characters took a peek at the end of the script to form their theories. I've seen better investigating in Scooby-Doo cartoons.
So Mick gets a job working on the studio lot so he can figure out what the movie studio is up to, because clearly they're guilty of something, with their fancy clothes and their wireless phones. Hmm, a Hollywood studio that's fudging their numbers - isn't that EVERY movie studio in L.A.? Nope, they must be smuggling or involved in human trafficking or something, because, well, you know those Hollywood types. Eventually Mick cracks the case, and proves to the police that this entire plot was stolen from "Beverly Hills Cop 3".
Really, there's not an ounce of logic in the whole film. It's not quite as bad as "The Radioland Murders", but it's close. But stand back, because I'm going to force a comparison between Paul Hogan and James Dean. This should only be attempted by professionals with the proper training who are wearing protective gear, don't try this at home. In his own way, Paul Hogan was BIG in the 1980's, much like Dean was in the 1950's. He had that whole "shrimp on the barbie" thing going, and people STILL say that today, even if it's ironically. He did a few commercials for Australian tourism, which I believe worked, causing the Aussie Minister of Tourism to very publicly quit, since he'd been horribly upstaged. (another true fact I just made up...)
But James Dean had the good sense to die JUST as his career was taking off - who knows what might have been, but he became immortal on the silver screen. Audiences were desperate to see his last 2 films, because they knew there would be no more. And the public never had to see him grow old or fat, or be forced to make commercials for spark plugs or canned beans, or have to reprise one of his roles years later in "Rebel 2: Now With More Cause". He never saw the state of show business today, which is half-fueled by scandal and paparazzi shots of reality-TV stars. Soon we'll all be working with a gossip-based economy - you'll just go into a store and pick out your groceries, tell the checkout clerk about three celebrity breakups, and you'll be on your way.
No mileage added to the counter tonight, since I'm still in L.A. I'll be here for a few more days before moving on, since Hollywood just LOVES making films about itself. There was some easily-obtained footage of LAX in this film, along with some skyscrapers and Beverly Hills mansions, so I'm good with the theme.
Also starring Linda Kozlowski, Jere Burns, character villain Jonathan Banks, Aida Turturro (last seen in "Fallen"), with cameos from Paul Rodriguez, Mike Tyson (last seen in "The Hangover"), John Billingsley (last seen in "2012").
RATING: 3 out of 10 wind machines (just like this film, they blow...)
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