BE COOL

It's hot. It's damn hot—103 degrees and rising. I decide the best course of action is to rent a movie, stay out of the unbearable Texas heat, crank up the air conditioning, sip a few brewskis and relax in front of my 42-inch Mitsubishi. So I race over to the local Blockbuster and right there, center shelf, I spot a film titled BE COOL. Yeah, that's the ticket—BE COOL.

A couple of hours later I discover I've paid $4.29 (tax included) to submit myself to something even more unbearable than the unrelenting hellish heat outside, something more unbearable than anything I've tried to watch since F-TROOP, something even more unbearable than being a long-suffering Chicago Cubs fan. BE COOL ain't… It ain't cool at all. And the fault lies with one individual whose unparalleled incompetence is so pervasive, I think he'll screw up his own funeral. Mark my words.

You see, this should have been a vastly entertaining feature film. The cast is A-list all the way: John Travolta, Uma Thurman, Cedric the Entertainer, Danny DeVito, James Woods, Harvey Keitel. Throw in The Rock, Vince Vaughn, Gene Simmons (co-founder of KISS) and Steven Tyler and Aerosmith along with The Black Eyed Peas and a whole host of other top-notch on-screen elements and this should have been a vastly entertaining feature film. All this talent is brought together for a project based on an Elmore Leonard novel and it doesn't get better than that—yes, this should have been a vastly entertaining feature film. There—I've said it not once, but three damn times.

Shoulda, coulda, woulda—but because of the total incompetence of one no-talent hack we end up not with a vastly entertaining feature film, but with a boring, slow-paced, hackneyed, overblown big budget fiasco. Thank you Mr. F. Gary Gray, the Director-In-Name-Only of this extremely disappointing shoulda been.

According to The Internet Movie Database, the “F” stands for “Felix”. Felix my ass—it stands for “f*#%-up”. This guy couldn't finger paint his way out of the first grade given his total lack of creativity. What's more inexcusable is that he lacks even a modicum of the most rudimentary principles of film directing. “Lights. Camera…ah, what comes next?”

John Travolta has a nice line in the movie: “If you're important, people will wait.” Let me add: “If you're a bozo, people will notice.” Take a hike, Mr. F. Gary Gray, and don't you come back no more, no more.

Think I'm overreacting? If so, do me this one favor: screen THE BLUES BROTHERS and then try and sit through BE COOL. The difference is more than night and day, black and white, ac/dc. Whereas THE BLUES BROTHERS explodes off the screen with high-octane musical energy, BE COOL limps along lamely, totally devoid of anything resembling energy or vitality. I am positive you'll see what I mean. Not since W. D. Richter was allowed to helm THE ADVENTURES OF BUCKAROO BANZAI has such a good script and well packaged project been so wantonly mis-directed. And that, folks, took place way back in 1984.