{"id":8220,"date":"2024-11-12T00:15:59","date_gmt":"2024-11-12T05:15:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/?p=8220"},"modified":"2024-11-12T00:15:59","modified_gmt":"2024-11-12T05:15:59","slug":"the-adventures-of-pluto-nash","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/2024\/11\/12\/the-adventures-of-pluto-nash\/","title":{"rendered":"The Adventures of Pluto Nash"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"The Adventures of Pluto Nash<\/strong> (2002)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Warner Bros.\/Comedy-Sci-Fi-Action\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 95 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated PG-13 (violence, sexual humor, language)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Ron Underwood\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Neil Cuthbert\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: John Powell\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Oliver Wood\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: August 16, 2002 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Eddie Murphy, Randy Quaid, Rosario Dawson, Joe Pantoliano, Jay Mohr, Luis Guzman, James Rebhorn, Peter Boyle, Burt Young, Miguel A. Nunez Jr., Pam Grier, John Cleese, Victor Varnado, Illeana Douglas, Jacynthe Rene, Lilo Brancato, Alissa Kramer, Heidi Kramer, Alec Baldwin (uncredited).\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Box Office: $4.4M (US)\/$7.1M (World)<\/p>\n

Rating<\/strong>: ** \u00bd<\/p>\n

\u00a0Everything about the $100 million sci-fi-comedy The Adventures of Pluto Nash<\/strong> screamed \u201cSTINKER!\u201d It had been in development since the mid-80s. It had a troubled production history marked by star Eddie Murphy\u2019s difficult on-set behavior. It underwent an inordinate amount of post-production tinkering. It sat on the shelf for more than a year before seeing the inside of movie theaters. The studio declined to hold ANY pre-release screenings. Eddie and the rest of the cast refused to promote it. It went on to become one of the biggest box office bombs in the history of American cinema making only $4.4 million against a $100 million budget and an additional $20 million in marketing costs. You want to know the funny part? It\u2019s really not all that bad.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Let\u2019s get something straight right off the bat. The Adventures of Pluto Nash<\/strong> isn\u2019t funny. Let me rephrase that. It\u2019s about as funny as a mash-up of Ishtar and Town & Country. Every joke lands with a thud that can be heard in space. When I did laugh, I did so ironically. I couldn\u2019t believe the cinematic train wreck I was witnessing. I felt that way when I saw it at the movies in \u201802 and again when I rewatched it this past weekend. On that level, I enjoyed The Adventures of Pluto Nash<\/strong>…. sort of.<\/p>\n

\u00a0It opens in the year 2080 when ex-smuggler Pluto Nash (Murphy) buys a failing nightclub in order to save his friend, Polish crooner Anthony Frankowski (Mohr, Jerry Maguire), from having acid poured down his throat by mobsters for falling behind on his loan payments. Why he opts to wear a Scottish kilt on stage, I don\u2019t know. Seven years later, Club Pluto is the most popular club in the lunar colony of Little America. One night, a couple of thugs working for notorious mob boss Rex Crater show up offering to buy the club for $10 million. He turns them down flat. They retaliate by blowing the joint to smithereens.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Knowing they\u2019ll be coming for him next, Pluto goes on the run with his robot\/best friend Bruno (Quaid, Christmas Vacation) and new server Dina Lake (Dawson, Josie and the Pussycats), a singer stranded on the Moon after a gig at another club fell through. Pluto decides the best thing to do is track down and confront the never-seen Crater at his casino\/hotel in Moon Beach. Notice that I haven\u2019t credited any actor as \u201cRex Crater\u201d? Why, you ask? Let\u2019s put it this way. At one point, Crater is linked to illegal human cloning. Starting to get the picture? Good, let\u2019s move on.<\/p>\n

\u00a0I\u2019m going to go out on a limb and say The Adventures of Pluto Nash<\/strong> is the best of the crummy movies Murphy starred in around that time- i.e. Nutty Professor II: The Klumps, Dr. Dolittle 2, Showtime and I Spy. Shrek doesn\u2019t count because he only lent his voice. But let\u2019s be clear, it\u2019s only the best because of its way-out premise. It takes place in a futuristic world where currency bears the likeness of Hillary Clinton and Trump owns real estate on the lunar surface. What The Adventures of Pluto Nash<\/strong> lacks in humor, it makes up for in weirdness. It\u2019s not funny, it\u2019s bizarre! How bizarre? Look no further than Quaid\u2019s robotic character. He always has this goofy look on his face that says he\u2019s either overly happy or planning to tear apart every human in sight at any moment. Incidentally, he does the latter to an overly friendly talking female slot machine. If I didn\u2019t know better, I\u2019d swear everybody involved with The Adventures of Pluto Nash<\/strong> was on cocaine. An idea like this can only come from long-term drug use. It\u2019s freaking out there!<\/p>\n

\u00a0What\u2019s really crazy about The Adventures of Pluto Nash <\/strong>is the roster of actors director Ron Underwood (City Slickers) somehow managed to hire. How did he convince them to appear in a movie clearly destined to fail? For Murphy, it was obvious a cash-grab. You can tell by the way he phones in his performance(s). He doesn\u2019t even try anymore yet he\u2019s still very much at the center of the action. His ego is roughly the size of Mount Rushmore by now, maybe bigger. Mohr is okay as the no-talent singer who becomes the famous Italian crooner Tony Francis after heeding Pluto\u2019s career advice. His real-life inspiration is obvious based on songs like \u201cFly Me to the Moon\u201d and \u201cMy Kind of Town (Moon Beach Is)\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u00a0The supporting cast includes some pretty big names. Over the course of 95 minutes, you\u2019ll see Joe Pantoliano (The Matrix), Luis Guzman (Boogie Nights), Pam Grier (Jackie Brown), James Rebhorn (Independence Day), Peter Boyle (Young Frankenstein), Burt Young (Rocky I-VI), Miguel A. Nunez Jr. (Friday the 13th<\/sup> Part V: A New Beginning), John Cleese (A Fish Called Wanda), Illeana Douglas (To Die For) and an uncredited Alec Baldwin (The Hunt for Red October).<\/p>\n

\u00a0The Adventures of Pluto Nash<\/strong> is what you\u2019d call a hot mess. The plot is convoluted and the actors run around like chickens with their heads cut off. For a movie that cost upwards of $100 mil, the special effects look awful cheap. The production design is cool though. It\u2019s like a mix of Total Recall and the campy Flash Gordon. The rest of the movie is an unqualified disaster. That\u2019s what I like about it. It\u2019s the same reason I enjoy watching 1941, Howard the Duck and Hudson Hawk. The makers dumped so much money into them; it\u2019s almost a shame to let them go unenjoyed. I admit it, I have a perverse fascination with big-budget flops. What the majority of the moviegoing public hates about them, I love. Frankly, I\u2019d rather watch The Adventures of Pluto Nash<\/strong> than some of the Best Picture winners of the past 25 years. The snobby elitists can keep The English Patient, The Hurt Locker and Birdman. Please don\u2019t hold that against me.\"\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Adventures of Pluto Nash (2002)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Warner Bros.\/Comedy-Sci-Fi-Action\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 95 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated PG-13 (violence, sexual humor, language)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Ron Underwood\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Neil Cuthbert\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: John Powell\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Oliver Wood\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: August 16, 2002 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Eddie Murphy, Randy Quaid, Rosario Dawson, Joe Pantoliano, Jay Mohr, Luis Guzman, James Rebhorn, Peter Boyle, Burt Young, Miguel […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":8407,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[18,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8220","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-comedies","category-guilty-pleasures"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/11\/The-Adventures-of-Pluto-Nas.jpg?fit=620%2C348&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8220","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8220"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8220\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8409,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8220\/revisions\/8409"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8407"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8220"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8220"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8220"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}