The Nutty Professor (1996)

Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde modernized to accomodate modern social issues (physical perfection), strung together with a Superman revelation of true identity at the end. The film is morally immaculate, almost as if the studio said “let’s make a film where fat people tell the public that being fat is OK” and this movie followed. For idiot audiences, the moral is spelled out in a monologue–be happy with yourself. I wonder: does the director have a complex about his obesity? A complex so severe that he must defend himself to the public with his work? The story sucks (the second scene in the bar was one of the only decent scenes). Great make-up and effects, but for what? The effects should not be the center of the story. A typical 90’s production (excessive editing, special effects, no emotion, shallow/stock characters). The power of television on the public is clearly portrayed.

Eddie was OK. Eddie playing all the parts is kinda cool (and probably saved the studio a lot of money), but in practice it rarely generates characters that are different from the main one and interesting in their own way. It DID, however, work for the grandma, who was hilarious.