|
Burning Out – Cheech and Chong: Still Smokin’ By: PoisonRamune, the Apathetic Lizardman This may come as a huge shock to you, but I love stoner movies. There’s nothing better than watching a comedy that’s dumbed down a bit, but still retains its humor even after you’ve turned your brain to soup. Amongst the thousands of stoner movies out there, the Cheech and Chong series reigns supreme in terms of recognition as they’re some of the first films that have starred marijuana.
Most of Cheech and Chong’s work is very top notch and incredibly funny, even if you don’t use dope. From their albums, movies and television cameos, these guys are top notch. I will admit that their solo movies (Far Out Man and Born in the East LA) aren’t nearly as good as their films in which they play Pedro De Pacas and Anthony Stoner, they still are pretty fun to watch on any faded Sunday. There is one movie in the Cheech and Chong series of films that is notably bad. Cheech and Chong: Still Smokin’ is not only a terrible Cheech and Chong film, but quite possibly one of the worst films I’ve ever seen. Surprisingly, Still Smokin’ came out relatively early during in the stony duo’s movie career, something I find very strange since I found Cheech and Chong’s Corsican Brothers easier to watch then Still Smokin’. What makes Still Smokin’ such a bad film is the fact that it’s not really a movie, but rather like the concept for many movies. It’s almost as if Cheech and Chong made a video accompaniment to one of their albums and padded it with a frame story. The film is about Cheech Marin and Tommy Chong (the actors, not the characters) being invited to some sort of press conference and stage show in Amsterdam by mistake, as they were thought to be Burt Reynolds and Dolly Parton. How this mistake occurs, I’m quite unsure. The film was pretty hard to follow as I was very high and tired while watching it along with the fact that the supporting cast has terribly fake sounding Dutch accents (which end up being more so distracting, rather than funny). You would think that setting the film in Amsterdam would at least make the movie bearable through a contact high. However, there are only 2 scenes in the film in which the 2 are seen chiefing it up and they’re not very eventful or even the least bit entertaining. Thankfully, the awful frame story is not the meat of the film. In fact, most of the movie’s comedic content (or should I say “attempt at presenting comedic content”) are the recurring day dreams of Tommy Chong. Throughout the film Chong habitually spaces out or shares an idea for their next movie that segues into a short 10-15 minute skit starring the 2 stoners. Sadly, most of the skits are pretty lackluster; they’re seemingly devoid of inspiration and wit, the most notably bad ones are: the dope-a-thon, gays in space, wrestling with the invisible man, and a sad parody of ET. One skit that is worth the watch is the Dragnet parody. It really proves that Tommy Chong can be a semi-versatile actor. Especially since I’m so used to seeing him as: Anthony Stoner, the Squirrel Master, or Leo; I didn’t even recognize him as the drug busting cop until Ron pointed it out. The movie had great potential to be another awesome, classic Cheech and Chong film. Cheech and Chong being mistaken for someone else in Amsterdam actually sounds like a movie that should have been amazingly hilarious. It could have very damn well written itself. Unfortunately, instead of being another great film in the long line of funny Cheech and Chong movies, Still Smokin’ turns out to be an agonizingly unfunny hour and a half with our 2 favorite stoners. The movie should have been called “We’re Cheech and Chong: Fuck You,” it would have been a more appropriate title and probably would have made me feel a lot better after watching it.
|
