The Writer's Poke

After watching Sgt. Bilko and hearing what my friends had to say about The Jerk (1979), I realized that I was too harsh in my assessment of The Jerk. It had a lot of funny bits, and yes, it might even be a homage to Citizen Kane, for Pete's sake. Sgt. Bilko might have its defenders too, but for now, I'm not going to be one of them. The movie is based on the 1950s TV series, and I can imagine a Steve Martin as a young boy watching that show, much like I would have been watching Gomer Pyle, USMC, at the same age. But somehow, I never got into the characters or the story. I'm a big fan not only of Martin, but also his costars in this one, Phil Hartman and Dan Akroyd. Nothing about their characters intrigues me, however, and this is also one of the rare films that even Martin admits that maybe the concept just didn't work. What was it about the 1990s? Did any of us make it through that decade unscathed? Thanks, Nirvana.

I felt like I missed something with this one. In Roger Ebert's review of The Jerk (1979), he indicated that the audience reaction to comedy is subjective in movies. I thought that was an odd observation, but his observation might have been an apology for him not finding the humor in The Jerk. Then, in his review for Bowfinger, Ebert wrote that the comedy "works on all cylinders." Well, now I'm the one wondering what I missed, because I just didn't find it all that funny. I like the basic premise: Bowfinger (Steve Martin) is a director that's never made a movie. He's got an idea to make a movie with Kit Ramsey (Eddie Murphy), one of the hottest African American actors working in Hollywood, but the catch is, he will make the film without Ramsey ever knowing he's in it, because Ramsey would never make a movie for an unknown director like Bowfinger. The idea is absurd, but it's interesting to see how this film is able to make the concept "work....