Movie Review The Underdoggs

The Underdoggs (2024) 

Directed by Charles Stone III

Written by Danny Segal, Isaac Schamis 

Starring Snoop Dogg, Tika Sumpter, Mike Epps 

Release Date January 26th, 2024 

Published January 25th, 2024 

I know it's wrong. I am well aware that the new Amazon Prime-Snoop Dogg comedy, The Underdoggs is objectively, not a good movie. It's amateurish, it's childish, it's derivative, and it's needlessly filthy for a movie that features a mostly child cast. And yet, there is this undeniable element that I cannot deny and that is my affection for Snoop Dogg. Snoop has crafted one of the more eclectic and straight up odd careers in entertainment history. He was a fearsome gangsta rapper who may or may not have been involved in actual murders. He's also a close friend and partner to Martha Stewart. He's known for smoking more weed than your average small American city and is one of the most savvy marketers of his brand going today. He's an enigma, a dynamic, charming and entirely unpredictable character. 

It's that same unpredictable, enigmatic charm that Snoop brings to his first film leading role since the failed horror franchise Bones in 2001, Snoop has a laid back charisma that I find irresistible. Snoop is Jaycen Two J's Jennings in The Underdoggs, a disgraced former NFL Wide Receiver better known for his bad behavior than his on the field heroics. In a classic Mighty Ducks scenario, Jaycen gets himself into an accident that is entirely his fault and is sentenced to community service. In this case, Jaycen is sentenced to cleaning up a park in his old neighborhood in Long Beach. While cleaning up dog poop, Jaycen sees a group of kids playing Pee-Wee Football, badly. 

Find my full length review at Geeks.Media 

Movie Review Soul Plane

Soul Plane (2004) 

Directed by Jesse Terrero

Written by Chuck Wilson, Bo Zenga 

Starring Kevin Hart, Method Man, Snoop Dogg, Tom Arnold, Arielle Kebbel

Release Date May 28th, 2004 

Published May 27th, 2004 

Seeing as many films as I do, I can't tell you how many times a trailer has been better than the movie. That is most certainly the case with Soul Plane. It had a terrific trailer that evoked the best of the Airplane and Scary Movie series only to turn out even more unwatchable than the worst of the Naked Gun franchise.

Comedian Kevin Hart stars as Nashawn, a guy who had a really bad experience on an airplane ride. So bad that he was awarded a settlement so large he was able to start his own airline. NWA is Nashawn Wade Airlines (Niggas Wit Airplanes would have been funny but they didn't use it). It's the first airline aimed at African-Americans with all the stereotypical amenities. Airplanes with bouncing hydraulics, pimped colors and spinning hubcaps. The terminal is named for Malcolm X and has a fried chicken stand.

On the plane’s maiden voyage, Nashawn is joined by his cousin Muggsy (Method Man) who shows music videos in the plane, hosts a mile high nightclubn and runs cockfights in the baggage area. Muggsy also hires the pilot, Captain Mack (Snoop Dogg), whose fear of heights and proclivity for mind-altering mushrooms becomes a problem once the plane is in the air.

As for passengers, there is one white family on the plane, the Hunkee (pronounced Honky) family. Dad (Tom Arnold), Stepmom (Missi Pyle), son Billy (Ryan Pinkston) and daughter Heather (Arielle Kebbel). While Dad chases the kids around the plane, Billy gets a rap star makeover and Heather is seeking a boyfriend in the club. As for the stepmom, she is trying to find out if that legend about African-American men, you know the one, is true.

All of this sounds like it could be funny but in the hands of first time Director Jesse Terrero it's poorly executed. The script by Bo Zenga and Chuck Wilson feels like two completely different scripts combined to make one movie. One is a straight three act comedy with a linear story and subplots and the other is an outlandish Airplane-style sendup. Together they are a painfully misshapen unfunny collection of groan-inducing jokes crammed into a tremendously dull story of family togetherness and growing up. Huh?

I haven't seen Kevin Hart's standup act but it must be funnier than the many attempts to make him a mainstream star. Two failed sitcoms and now this horrendous movie, either Hart is not funny or he needs to fire his agent. Method Man on the other hand continues to impress me. His upcoming sitcom looks iffy but his role in How High and his limited work in this film shows a charismatic comic presence almost as funny as some of his raps as part of the Wu-Tang Clan.

It looked so funny in the trailer. But then how many times has that happened?

Movie Review Malibu's Most Wanted

Malibu's Most Wanted (2003) 

Directed by John Whitesell 

Written by Jamie Kennedy, Nick Swardson 

Starring Jamie Kennedy, Taye Diggs, Anthony Anderson, Blair Underwood, Regina Hall, Bo Derek, Snoop Dogg 

Release Date April 18th, 2003 

Published April 16th, 2003 

I don't want to be mean but for the life of me I can't figure out what Jamie Kennedy has done to earn an over the title credit on a feature film. His career is dotted by a number of direct to video comedies like the dreadful Sol Goode and strange thrillers like Pretty When You Cry opposite Sam Elliott. Huh? He can't still be riding his minuscule success as the film geek in Scream 1 & 2.

It likely stems from the inexplicable success of his TV show, “The Jamie Kennedy Experience.” I use the term success loosely as it's difficult calling any show on the WB network a success. The show which incorporates sketch comedy and warmed over Tom Green street pranks appeals to teenage boys well enough that it makes sense that a marketer might pick up on Kennedy and see a product he can sell. That still doesn't quite explain how Malibu's Most Wanted made it to the big screen but nevertheless here it is.

Kennedy is B-Rad or really just Brad Gluckman, the son of a millionaire candidate for California governor (Ryan O'Neal). Brad fancies himself a gangsta based on his love of the stereotypical culture portrayed in so-called gangsta rap. B-Rad has just returned home to help his dad's campaign by helping to attract black people to the campaign. Brad's ingenious ideas include interrupting a live press conference with a horrible rap and appealing to a conference with female voters with a sign that states "Bill Gluckman is down with the Bitches and the Ho's).

Sensing that Brad is a liability to the campaign, Dad and his campaign advisor (Blair Underwood) conspire to cure Brad of his poseur ways. The idea is to hire a pair of black actors to abduct Brad and teach him what the gangsta lifestyle is really like. As Underwood's character puts it, they will "scare the black out of him.”

The campaign hires Sean (Taye Diggs) and P.J (Anthony Anderson) to play the gangstas. Unfortunately, neither actor knows anything about the hood. In turn, they hire PJ's cousin Shondra (Regina Hall) to help them learn what the hood is like so they can scare Brad.

Everything goes to plan as Sean and P.J kidnap Brad with Shondra as bait and bring him to Shondra's house in what was formerly known as South Central Los Angeles. Sean and P.J play up gangster personas all the while complimenting each other on how authentic their characters are. Diggs and Anderson are the film's main assets and provide the only solid laughs.

The set up works only in short spurts and only in the scenes with Diggs and Anderson who are so good at times they make Kennedy seem like a co-star in his own movie. Indeed a film taken from Sean and PJ's perspective would have been far funnier than what we get in Malibu's Most Wanted. At about the one hour mark of the 80 minute movie, Sean and P.J are shoved into the background in favor of Brad's forced love story with Shondra and another kidnapping, this time by a real gangsta named Tec (Damien Dante Wayans). It is then that Malibu's Most Wanted loses what little humor it generates.

Taye Diggs is one of the smartest actors working today. Sadly, like Tom Cruise or Brad Pitt, his good looks often prevent people from taking his talent seriously. Because of his boy toy role in How Stella Got Her Groove Back, Diggs will forever be typecast in the role of eye candy for drawing women into theaters. This obscures his work which in films as varied as the cheesy horror sendup House On Haunted Hill to the hip hop romance Brown Sugar has shown great wit and an ability to play off of anyone and hold his own. Most recently, Diggs had a terrific guest turn on the TV show “Ed” where he played himself, or rather what Ed thought Taye Diggs would be like if he met him in person.

You could call early 2003 the year of uncomfortable racial humor. There’s been Steve Martin and Queen Latifah in the tepid Bringing Down The House, Chris Rock's caustic political satire Head Of State and now Malibu's Most Wanted. Only Head Of State manages to do something with its racial content with Rock skewing racism from all sides. Bringing Down The House wants to satirize white stereotypes of black culture but lacks the courage to break from a sitcom formula to take on the subject. Malibu's Most Wanted is even less successful because it lacks the insight into Brad's identity to either portray it sympathetically or skewer satirically. Kennedy seems to want it both ways. He wants the audience to sympathize with Brad and also laugh at his over the top antics.

The elements of the sketch comedy character that B-Rad was conceived from don't translate to an 80-minute feature, and without a perspective, either sympathetic or satiric, you’re left with nothing but a confused character and audience. What this film says about Jamie Kennedy as a viable movie star is very little. The marketing campaign may lure people to theaters but the film itself will leave them wondering why they wasted the time to see it.

Movie Review: The Real Cancun

The Real Cancun (2003) 

Directed by Rick De Oliveira 

Written by Brian Caldirola 

Starring Benjamin Fletcher, Laura Ramsey, Snoop Dogg, Simple Plan 

Release Date April 25th, 2003 

Published April 30th, 2003 

What do you get when you cross “Girls Gone Wild” with MTV's “The Real World?” You get the tepid sociological experiment The Real Cancun. Taking the conceits of reality TV and translating them to the loosened standards of the big screen, the producers of America’s first reality show have created a new category that is not quite documentary but not exactly verite either. It's a new genre that is being called "reality movies.” Reality in it's pseudo TV definition. But thanks to this film’s box office belly flop, the genre is likely DOA. Shot over 1 one week, edited in 6 weeks and in theaters just as quickly, The Real Cancun is about a group of strangers thrown together in a beautiful Cancun hotel and filmed 24 hours a day, just like “The Real World.”

This collection of buff bodies and minimal intellect includes a pair of African American pals, Paul and Jorell, who speak more “player” than they act. A pair of friends, David and Heidi, who swear they are just friends (Yeah right). There are the twins, Nicole and Roxanne who provide the film’s “Girls Gone Wild” moment with their tandem flashing in the wet T-shirt contest. There is also Allan, the virginal 18 year old who before Cancun has never drank alcohol before. How long do you think that lasts? Another virginal character is Laura, a seemingly naïve 20 year old from Wisconsin who surprisingly maintains her virtue throughout the film.

Aside from Alan, the guys in this film are interchangeable caricatures of the worst in male stereotypes. There is the vapid underwear model Casey, who's catchphrase "Any of you girls wanna make out" is featured heavily in the film’s ads, and who is as stupid as his pick up line. Jeremy, who claims to have a girlfriend back home is the first in the house to 'get some.' In fact, he gets some from one of the girls in the house, though which interchangeably attractive girl it was escapes me. Jeremy then proceeds to ignore the girl the rest of the week. 

The other two guys, Matt and Fletch, pal around while Matt attempts to get a woman named Sarah to have sex with him. Sarah is a Vegas girl who claims she has a boyfriend she loves back home, this does not sop Matt in any way. Matt and Fletch are portrayed as such dopey testosterone-fueled morons that they will likely be the first to complain about how they were edited. Hey guys, before you complain remember you were the one wearing the Female Body Inspector T-shirts.

The Real Cancun is played as much as a good time as it is a social experiment. Of course it doesn't take much to mix alcohol and 20-somethings and end up with sex and various other debaucheries. What is surprising is how tame it really is. Anyone going for the boobs and sex won't be entirely disappointed but this is not “Girls Gone Wild.” For example, when one of the twins goes topless in the wet t-shirt contest, she covers her breasts with her hands as much as she can.

There really isn't much of a story here, though producers would like you to fall for Allan and his coming of age, so to speak. But Allan is so amazingly clueless that his minor personality switch isn't really that compelling. The movie’s best story arc involves Paul and Sky, a gorgeous African-American girl who has strict requirements on how she is to be courted and when Paul doesn't follow the rules her rebuff is quick and brutal. Paul doesn't sulk long and is soon in the sack with some girl off the beach, after which he spends his remaining days failing to win Sky back.

The Real Cancun is a tepid experiment in trying to convert the conceit of “The Real World” to the big screen. Though any of these people would make the cut on the TV show, their adventures aren't interesting enough to warrant a feature film. Remake The Real Cancun as a weekly series on HBO and maybe you have enough cheap thrills for late night TV.