By
Adam Pugh
Arizona Daily Wildcat
Grade: D
New French spin-off not likely to stick around long at the box office
Film remakes have never really been able to live up to the originals from which they are adapted. Taking contemporary themes and applying them to a movie of a different generation makes for bad combination. And the result is inevitably jokes that don't work, and a movie that flops.
"Just Visiting," a remake of 1993's French film "Les Visiteurs," takes the original, sticks it in a blender and pours it out - basically, "Just Visiting" has lost much of the humor of the original somewhere in the translation.
After a mishap in his palace, French nobleman Count Thibault (Jean Reno) drinks a potion to go back in time to undo his mistake. But because the Wizard's (Malcolm McDowell) potion lacks a key ingredient, the potion sends the Count and his servant AndrŽ (Christian Clavier) to the 21st century rather than back to the 12th. The film explores the strange, new millenium from the perspective of these two medieval men.
There are points in this film where silence will surely fill the theater. It's almost as if the actors pause, waiting for the audience to laugh at their jokes which lack any sort of comedic value. There is no dialogue or music to keep the film flowing from scene to scene.
In the original movie, adventures taking place throughout the Count's castle in France keep the film lively. But for some reason, "Just Visiting" takes place in modern-day Chicago. This difference changes the entire story - which was originally extremely funny - from its original form, making it extremely dull-witted.
And now for an example of this weak attempt at humor - one scene sets the Count and AndrŽ against a small truck which the they mistake for a monster. The two proceed to smash the car to pieces while stereo is blasting "The Macarena." After destroying the car - and with it, the timeless dance classic - AndrŽ exclaims, "We have killed it!" So much for comedy.
French filmmaker Jean-Marie Gaubert, who also directed the original, tries his hand at American cinema, but fails to make much more than just another boring comedy. The movie also stars Christina Applegate, Tara Reid, and Bridgette Wilson-Sampras, who all bring the level of acting to an all-time low. Reid's ditzy character only serves to magnify the poor quality of "acting" of which she is capable.
The film was originally a comedic adventure of a smart count and the dim-witted subject. Now, it is a story of a boring mishap that ends happily ever after. And with a running time of 88 minutes, "Just Visiting" is not worth the time.
This watered-down version of the original has nothing new to add to American cinema. The idea is funny, but a whole lot of the story was lost in the rewriting of this French classic.
