SOC
10-03-2007, 09:24 AM
Oh, Eddie. Oh, Eddie, Eddie, Eddie. What have you done? What were you thinking? Were you even thinking at all? On leaving the cinema, all I wanted to do was sit Eddie Murphy down and show him some of his old films you know, films like 48 Hours, Trading Places, Beverly Hills Cop and Coming To America. Just to remind him that he was once a very funny man. Because now it seems that the only time Eddie Murphy is funny on screen is when he's being an ass.
Eddie plays Norbit, the dull, geeky title character. He has a very fat and very nasty wife named Rasputia also played by Eddie. Norbit was raised by Mr Wong again played by Eddie who owns the Golden Wonton Restaurant and Orphanage. He's also very, very racist. At the orphanage, Norbit's only friend is little Kate, his soulmate and constant companion (awwwww). But when Kate is adopted, Norbits alone ... until a few years later when he meets Rasputia in the school playground. She deals with the bullies who are picking on Norbit and takes him under her wing. So, they grow up, get married and Norbit grows more and more unhappy. The dickhead.
But Norbit's miserable world undergoes a huge upheaval when a grown-up Kate now played by the beautiful, but frighteningly thin (somebody get this girl a hamburger, stat), Thandie Newton returns to town to buy the old orphanage from the retiring Mr Wong. But her conman fiancee (Cuba Gooding Jr) has other plans. He's in cahoots with Rasputia's evil brothers to turn the orphanage into a titty bar which they want to call The Nipplopolis. Which is probably the best joke in the whole film. A titty bar. Called Nipplopolis. Anyhoo, Norbit, of course, falls in love with Kate all over again and does all he can to get away from Rasputia. And does he end up with Kate by the time the (long overdue) credits roll? Don't be stupid, of course he does; this is a Hollywood romantic comedy and a happy ending is required by law.
Norbit is just a mess of a movie. It's nasty, mysoginistic, racist, cruel and just not funny. I think I laughed just once through the whole film, and that was at a talking dog (talking dogs are always funny, no matter what anybody else tells you). As a romantic comedy, it lacks any originality. The characters are either stereotyped cliches (Mr Wong; Rasputia's dumb-as-a-stump, bully-boy brothers; the fast-talking pimps), deadly dull (Norbit himself) or irredeemably awful Rasputia. What can I say about her, apart from the fact that she is probably the most evil, vile character to appear on screen since George W Bush gave his last State of The Union address.
Eddie Murphy should have learned his lesson from the Martin Lawrence abomination, Big Momma's House the days when you can make fun of fat women, and especially fat black women, are long gone. It's no surprise he didn't win an Oscar for Dreamgirls; the Academy voters must have seen Norbit and immediately burned his name from their minds. The only person who walks away from this wreck with their dignity intact is makeup supremo Rick Baker, who did the prosthetics for Mr Wong and Rasputia. Baker who has won 6 Oscars and worked on such films as Star Wars, An American Werewolf In London, Coming To America, Men In Black and Hellboy can hold his head high. His work, as always, is outstanding. Everybody else (yes, including you, Thandie) should be thoroughly ashamed of themselves.
Eddie plays Norbit, the dull, geeky title character. He has a very fat and very nasty wife named Rasputia also played by Eddie. Norbit was raised by Mr Wong again played by Eddie who owns the Golden Wonton Restaurant and Orphanage. He's also very, very racist. At the orphanage, Norbit's only friend is little Kate, his soulmate and constant companion (awwwww). But when Kate is adopted, Norbits alone ... until a few years later when he meets Rasputia in the school playground. She deals with the bullies who are picking on Norbit and takes him under her wing. So, they grow up, get married and Norbit grows more and more unhappy. The dickhead.
But Norbit's miserable world undergoes a huge upheaval when a grown-up Kate now played by the beautiful, but frighteningly thin (somebody get this girl a hamburger, stat), Thandie Newton returns to town to buy the old orphanage from the retiring Mr Wong. But her conman fiancee (Cuba Gooding Jr) has other plans. He's in cahoots with Rasputia's evil brothers to turn the orphanage into a titty bar which they want to call The Nipplopolis. Which is probably the best joke in the whole film. A titty bar. Called Nipplopolis. Anyhoo, Norbit, of course, falls in love with Kate all over again and does all he can to get away from Rasputia. And does he end up with Kate by the time the (long overdue) credits roll? Don't be stupid, of course he does; this is a Hollywood romantic comedy and a happy ending is required by law.
Norbit is just a mess of a movie. It's nasty, mysoginistic, racist, cruel and just not funny. I think I laughed just once through the whole film, and that was at a talking dog (talking dogs are always funny, no matter what anybody else tells you). As a romantic comedy, it lacks any originality. The characters are either stereotyped cliches (Mr Wong; Rasputia's dumb-as-a-stump, bully-boy brothers; the fast-talking pimps), deadly dull (Norbit himself) or irredeemably awful Rasputia. What can I say about her, apart from the fact that she is probably the most evil, vile character to appear on screen since George W Bush gave his last State of The Union address.
Eddie Murphy should have learned his lesson from the Martin Lawrence abomination, Big Momma's House the days when you can make fun of fat women, and especially fat black women, are long gone. It's no surprise he didn't win an Oscar for Dreamgirls; the Academy voters must have seen Norbit and immediately burned his name from their minds. The only person who walks away from this wreck with their dignity intact is makeup supremo Rick Baker, who did the prosthetics for Mr Wong and Rasputia. Baker who has won 6 Oscars and worked on such films as Star Wars, An American Werewolf In London, Coming To America, Men In Black and Hellboy can hold his head high. His work, as always, is outstanding. Everybody else (yes, including you, Thandie) should be thoroughly ashamed of themselves.