Pluto Nash

• Cert:
• Running time: 95 minutes
• Year: 2002
• Released: 30th August 2002
• Widescreen Ratio: 1.85:1
• Rating: 4/10

Director:

(City Slickers, Pluto Nash, Tremors)

Cast:

For a film that’s spent nearly two years on the shelf and wasn’t screenedfor the press for fear of terrible reviews, this isn’t quite thecatastrophe I was expecting.

Judging by the box office tanking it enduredon its recent release in the States, where it sank without trace havingscraped together barely $4m against a $90m production budget, these twofactors have done its reputation no favours whatsoever. That’s not to sayPluto Nash is any good though – it’s very much from the Scooby-Doo schoolof D+ indifference.

The action begins on the Moon (and why not?) in the year 2080 where Murphyplays the titular Pluto, a one time smuggler recently released from jailand looking to go legit. We meet him in his friend Tony’s bar and, after anencounter with some gangsters to whom Tony owns money, Pluto ends up as thebar’s owner. Fast forward seven years and Club Pluto is the most successfuljoint in town (the town being Little America). The rather thin story thenevolves when Pluto is approached by some heavies representing the infamouscriminal, Rex Crater (droll) with an offer to buy his club so it can beturned into a casino. When Pluto declines, they blow up the club and try tokill him, so setting up the rest of the film as one long chase throughvarious lunar locations.

There’s really not much to get excited about here. The action sequences areflat and uninspired and the jokes are pretty poor. Some of the sets arenice and the special effects are adequate, although I can’t quite see wherethe $90m went. I guess quite a bit of it must have gone on the high calibresupporting cast, which is probably the main thing that lifts this film outof the dismal bracket and into the mediocre. Mind you, there are twoschools of thought here. Does the quality cast prevent the film from beinga complete travesty or is the quality cast wasted in such a sub-par movie?

Both these arguments hold water as, although most of them do decent work,they’re all nothing parts. Pantoliano, Mohr and Boyle are always good valueand Guzm=E1n, as ever, is an absolute joy, but their roles could just aseasily have been played by nameless nobodies.

There are a couple of wastedefforts though : Quaid (looking and sounding disturbingly like PaulGambaccini) is usually worth watching, but his turn as robot Bruno bringssurprisingly few chuckles ; Grier (as Pluto’s mother) looks as thoughJackie Brown never happened ; and Cleese (as a car computer/autopilot)could have been filming a TV advert. Murphy himself is strangely subduedand a little bored looking at times and, although he still has a certainscreen presence, it’s clear his best days are long behind him.

At the end of the day, it’s hard to see who Pluto Nash will appeal to.Adults will be fairly unimpressed by the whole affair and teenagers will belooking for more whizz and bang. It might have played well for undemandingkids but, for a PG certificate, there’s an awful lot of mild swearing andgunplay that probably makes it unsuitable for under 8s. If you still havean itch to see this, you’d better scratch it pretty quick, because I doubtit will be around very long, and will be forgotten quickly when it goes..