Mookie

Formulaic comedy like a zillion others. Just think about it : two characters forced to cooperate whereas they have nothing in common, a gentle man living a lot of misadventures in the company of a rugged brute ( who happens not so bad after all), a chimp as comic relief...doesn't it remind you of something? If not, you must be six months old!

Well, let's forget the originality and analyze the comedy : agreed, two or three gags are mildly amusing but most of them are unfunny, especially when the chimp is concerned. Worse, much of the "humor" lies in scatology, which is unworthy of a director who had previously made "Un Indien dans la ville", a fairly good adventure comedy.

"Mookie" would be a total flop but for his two main actors : Jacques Villeret, who could have given humanity to a dummy if he had had to play one, and Eric Cantona, surprisingly at ease in the shoes of a brutish, uptight boxer. Also commendable are the exotic locations : entirely shot in Mexico, you can get over the nonsense of the whole thing just by looking at the natural settings. Last but not least is the excellent soundtrack, a vivid compilation of catchy Mexican popular music.

To put it in a nutshell, if Mookie is an offense to your brain it is not to your eyes and your ears.