Intermission: Film's plot shortcomings shored up by impressive effects

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Film: "The Nutty Professor II: The Klumps"|ret||ret||tab|

Directed by: Peter Segal|ret||ret||tab|

Starring: Eddie Murphy and Janet Jackson|ret||ret||tab|

Rated: PG-13|ret||ret||tab|

In the 1963 Jerry Lewis version of "The Nutty Professor," the hopelessly nerdish Julius Kelp invents a formula that turns him into the smooth lounge lizard love god, Buddy Love. Lewis fans (which I am not) consider this his comedic masterpiece and many have pointed out that the Buddy Love character resembles Lewis's former partner, Dean Martin. |ret||ret||tab|

When Eddie Murphy remade the film in 1996, Buddy Love turned out to be the alter ego of Murphy's nerdish and overweight character, Sherman Klump. In that film, Murphy played not only the title role and his alter ego, but also nearly every member male and female of the Klump clan. Audiences ate it up, including the non-stop toilet humor, so it really comes as no surprise that a few years later, along comes "The Nutty Professor II: The Klumps."|ret||ret||tab|

On the up side, Rick Baker's makeup and the special effects department do a magnificent job of allowing Murphy to play no less than eight parts in this film, many of them on-screen at the same time. The prosthetic makeup is impeccable and digital technology has made effects along this line incredibly seamless. Many times during the film I had to remind myself that everyone in the scene was actually Eddie Murphy. Hats off to the production designers and special effects people.|ret||ret||tab|

On the other hand, "Nutty Professor II: The Klumps" is so filled with cheap laughs and scatological references that it's rendered insufferable within the first 15 minutes. To be fair, most of the audience was laughing. If ignited flatulence that catches a restaurant on fire, excrement being shot from the backside of a 12-foot-tall hamster and a randy grandmother who takes her dentures out during a completely inappropriate hot tub scene are your idea of humor, you'll laugh too.|ret||ret||tab|

As for the main story, Murphy is back as professor Sherman Klump, a brilliant geneticist who has just invented an anti-aging formula and is poised for riches and fame.|ret||ret||tab|

Sherman's love interest this time around is fellow professor Denise Gaines (Janet Jackson) and the only thing standing in the way of their eternal happiness is the occasional appearance of Sherman's inner bad boy, Buddy Love.|ret||ret||tab|

Sherman and his assistant isolate a stray gene in Sherman's genetic code and figure that if they can extract it, they can get rid of Buddy once and for all. The problem is, when the gene is pulled out of Sherman, it latches onto the genetic code of the lab's pet dog and Buddy Love, crossed with personality traits of the company canine, becomes incarnate.|ret||ret||tab|

Buddy knows that Sherman is going to make a lot of money with his fountain of youth formula and has designs to steal it and sell it as his own. |ret||ret||tab|

Meanwhile Sherman realizes that Buddy is indeed an integral part of himself and he is losing a great deal of brainpower by being split in two. |ret||ret||tab|

The mission becomes clear: Buddy must be re-incorporated into Sherman.|ret||ret||tab|

What doesn't become clear is nearly everything else in the plot. More a series of scenes to show off Murphy and the technology allowing him to play against himself on-screen, "The Klumps" degenerates into a mishmash of off-color jokes and cheap physical comedy. |ret||ret||tab|

Murphy is talented, without a doubt, and audiences, desensitized by gross-out comedies such as "There's Something About Mary" and "American Pie," seem to be going for this kind of humor nowadays. The trend doesn't seem to be losing any steam, so I expect we'll be seeing a lot more of this sort of low-brow humor approach for a few more Hollywood seasons. Thank goodness that most fads in the movie business tend to be somewhat short-lived. For now, "The Klumps" will be number one at the box office for at least this week and probably next.|ret||ret||tab|

This film is playing at Campbell 16 Cine, Springfield 8 and Town & Country 6.|ret||ret||tab|

(Jim Wunderle works at Associated Video Producers and is a Springfield free-lance writer and musician.)[[In-content Ad]]