MOVIE REVIEW: ‘Get Shorty’ sequel too long
This film is a continuation of John Travolta’s character he portrays in the critically acclaimed 1995 film “Get Shorty.” Travolta plays Chili Palmer, the coolest and most confident mob boss ever.
In the 1995 film, he moves out to Hollywood for some “business” and becomes tempted to stay there because of the glamour and endless wealth. The story of “Be Cool” begins nine years later as we see Chili still living in Hollywood and using his mobster skills in the movie industry as a savvy producer.
Although “Get Shorty” was a popular and highly esteemed film, and contributed a lot to Travolta’s comeback as a great movie star, “Be Cool” falls extremely short. With excessive violence, a combination of every type of comedy and throwing in too many special guest stars to count, “Be Cool” quickly becomes too much of a good thing.
At the start of “Be Cool”, Chili Palmer is complaining about the rigors of working in the movie industry and is considering changing careers. Without any specific planning, Chili becomes involved in the music industry as he tries to promote a hot new singer (Christina Milian, “Man of the House”) with a big voice, big attitude and breasts to match.
As we watch Travolta’s crusade to put Milian in the spotlight, we are introduced to an enormous cast of characters who each add their own color and humor to the film. These characters include Cedric the Entertainer as a suburban hit man, Andre Benjamin as a trigger happy gangsta, Vince Vaughan as a racially confused record manager, Uma Thurman as a trendy but struggling music producer and The Rock as a gay bodyguard (the list could go on and on).
All of the characters are all so colorful that combining so many of them makes “Be Cool” seem like a dizzying kaleidoscope that never stops spinning, in hopes to continually amaze the audience.
Sadly, I was far from amazed. Even though “Be Cool” had the average running time of two hours I found myself repeatedly looking at my watch, wondering how much longer I had to sit in the theater. While Chili persists in his new career, he discovers that the music industry is just as treacherous as working for the mafia. The plot increases in complexity, but lacks intensity, when every character wants to murder somebody else. Unfortunately, the director tries to make up for the lack of intensity by throwing in scenes of people getting shot to death.
Thankfully, Travolta is able to deflect all of the surrounding dangers with his inherent coolness as he speaks smoothly and dodges swiftly in response to his numerous enemies. This role of the suave leading man who always finds a way out of any problem has definitely been done by Travolta before. This repetition in movie roles does not make Travolta’s performance memorable.
We also see other famous celebrity guest stars like Danny DeVito, Anna Nicole Smith and Aerosmith, who all add nothing to the story. The comedy in the film ranges from dark to physical to witty but combining all of them in large amounts creates conflict and excess. “Be Cool” does a fine job as an over-the-top comedy but it tries too hard and has no satisfying result. Like the music industry itself, it’s filled with a lot of fluff and bling bling, which we don’t really need and which gets old really fast.
Casey T. Allen is a junior majoring in English and reviews movies for the Utah Statesman. Comments may be sent to him at caseyal@cc.usu.edu