BEFORE: Eddie Murphy carries over from "Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F" and I don't think this one's on topic for Father's Day, but it's kind of fallen through the cracks a few times and I just want to hide it here and cross it off the list, OK?
THE PLOT: A successful executive and womanizer finds his lifestyle choices have turned back on him when his new female boss turns out to be an even bigger deviant than he is.
AFTER: I feel like I should have some sort of non-numerical "mulligan" score in my rating system, something that kind of says, "Well, I'm way out of the target market or demographic for this one, plus it didn't really speak to me and it's also very off-topic for me this week, so no score." Because that's where my head is at, I guess this is a romantic comedy for lack of any better term, but it's from 1992 and simply ALL of the dating rules have changed for everybody since then, regardless of ethnic group or sexual orientation or any other measure of anything. This is pre-internet, pre-smart phone dating, like what even IS that? How did people ever survive in that world, when you couldn't just look up when a movie was playing, you had to go find a newspaper? Or you couldn't make a restaurant reservation by pushing some buttons on your phone, you had to GO THERE in person and put your name on a list - geez, it's like the stone age.
But I guess in the end, dating is dating and sex is sex, and it's all complicated and confusing and you had to ask somebody if they liked you, rather than read what they posted about you on X or Instagram. And I guess you had to look somebody straight on in the face and ask them out, instead of just texting "U up?" Really, it was a different time, I can't stress this enough. In today's film, an advertising executive acts like a serial dater, he's successful and he's got dozens of women in his little black book (don't even ask, just remember nobody saved numbers on their phones) but he had a habit of breaking up with them once he realized that some of them had nasty-looking feet. Relatable, but if I'm being honest, everyone's feet are nasty. Everyone's. So I think he was just using this as an excuse to never commit to any one woman.
Marcus' company gets acquired by a cosmetics company, Lady Eloise, which seems a bit unusual, I can't recall any instance of a make-up company just right out BUYING an advertising agency, I guess turning it into their in-house marketing department? It's a bit odd, when he was talking about a "merger" at the start of the film, it was confusing, because a merger is usually between two similar companies, one company buying the other is a totally different thing. Anyway, the merger/purchase is on and Marcus spends a night with the company's founder in order to get ahead, then he finds out she's just a figure-head and has no real power. Oopsie.
Next Marcus meets Jacqueline in the lobby, and after he comes on to her, he realizes she is his new boss. Oopsie again - but the whole film is kind of like this, Marcus just moves on to the next woman in line when things don't work out. He just keeps having sex to try to get forward in the company, and that's not cool by today's standards, maybe it was never cool to begin with. I mean, he's having sex with women to try to GET power, that's maybe not as bad as using his power to have sex with women, but perhaps it's a fine line between the two, safe here but only by a thin margin.
After a few business trips, he finds himself in a relationship with Jacqueline, however she ignores his feelings, manipulates him by using sex, and keeps trying to control him by dictating the terms of the relationships. Well, it's ironic because that's usually what HE does to women, tries to control them and not commit to them, and maybe he needed to be on the receiving end of that to learn his lesson. OK, we've reached the moral lesson of the film, he can just move on with his life and try better next time. Only that's NOT the end of the film by a longshot, but perhaps it should be.
Next he's propositioned by Helen Strangé, a big weird Grace Jones-type model played convincingly by Grace Jones. However, he turns her down because he's trying to be faithful to Jacqueline, only the model then gets very mad, because she heard from Jacqueline he was a great lover, and besides, who turns down a model? Marcus gets very upset that Jacqueline bragged about their affair to someone else, then his work begins to suffer, to the point where his boss (and lover) has to tell him to take some time off, and really, that should be the end of their relationship right there, hell, he shouldn't even BE in a relationship with his boss, it's a terrible conflict of interest.
During his downtime, Marcus spends time with Angela, who's dating his friend Gerard, who's been slow to "seal the deal" with her. Marcus also hosts Thanksgiving dinner, where Angela meets Gerard's parents, and it's all very awkward, but right after that, Angela stays to help clean up and ends up sleeping with Marcus. It makes sense, they both like "Star Trek", that's kind of important, and Marcus is on the rebound, eager to have a real relationship with someone who isn't his boss, it's just too bad he has to steal her away from Gerard, who's already upset that Marcus gets "all the women". Well, Gerard, you snooze, you lose. So Marcus is with Angela now, lessons learned, end of story, hey, it all worked out. Only AGAIN, that's not the end -
Marcus overhears Angela downplaying their relationship on a phone call with Jacqueline, and the next time Marcus sees Jacqueline, they sleep together again, and this is one main reason why you should never hang out with your ex. Angela is upset that he stayed out all night and rapidly figures out where he's been, so she quits AND breaks up with him, leaving Marcus with one final lesson and one last decision to make. Now he's got to apologize to both Gerard AND Angela, and try to mend all the fences. So many fences. But if he can do that, finally maybe there can be a resolution here. It's long overdue, though, I just don't understand why Marcus had to screw up so many times just to learn to treat women better. Why couldn't he just do that in the first place, it would have saved all of us so much time!
Directed by Reginald Hudlin (director of "The Ladies Man")
Also starring Robin Givens (last seen in "Head of State"), Halle Berry (last seen in "The Program"), David Alan Grier (last seen in "Kevin Hart & Chris Rock: Headliners Only"), Martin Lawrence (last seen in "Bad Boys: Ride or Die"), Grace Jones (last seen in "Keith Haring: Street Art Boy"), Geoffrey Holder (last seen in "Doctor Dolittle" (1967)), Eartha Kitt (last seen in "I Am Divine"), Chris Rock (last seen in "Albert Brooks: Defending My Life"), Tisha Campbell (last seen in "Zack and Miri Make a Porno"), Lela Rochon (last seen in "The Big Hit"), John Witherspoon (last seen in "The Ladies Man"), Bebe Drake (last seen in "Anywhere But Here"), John Canada Terrell (last seen in "The Five Heartbeats"), Leonard Jackson (last seen in "The Color Purple"), Jonathan P. Hicks (last seen in "The Great White Hype"), Irv Dotten (ditto), Tom Mardirosian (last seen in "That's My Boy"), Melvin Van Peebles (last heard in "Freakonomics"), Rhonda Jensen, Alyce Webb, Louise Vyent, Frank Rivers, Angela Logan, Chuck Pfeiffer (last seen in "Night Falls on Manhattan"), Raye Dowell (last seen in "Malcolm X"), Reginald Hudlin (last seen in "The Ladies Man"), Warrington Hudlin, Andre B. Blake (last seen in "Marry Me"), Kenny Blank (last seen in "Butterfly in the Sky"), Daryl Mitchell (ditto), Khanya Mkhize, Gene “Groove” Allen (last seen in "What's Love Got to Do with It"), Olga Merediz (last heard in "Spellbound"), Tracy Douglas, Shirley Kirkes Mar (last seen in "Frankie and Johnny"), with archive footage of Michael Jordan (last seen in "I Am Chris Farley"), William Shatner (also last seen in "Butterfly in the Sky"), Leonard Nimoy (last heard in "Sinbad: Beyond the Veil of Mists"), DeForrest Kelley (last seen in "Recorder: The Marion Stokes Project") and James Doohan (last seen in "For the Love of Spock").
RATING: 4 out of 10 watches for sale outside the Apollo Theater
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