THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, December 24, 1994 TAG: 9412230106
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E7 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Movie Review
SOURCE: BY MAL VINCENT, MOVIE CRITIC
LENGTH: Medium: 81 lines
IF YOU WANT a bummer, guaranteed to give you a blue Christmas, the comedy ``Mixed Nuts'' is the ticket.
The mystery is how so many fine talents, both before and behind the camera, could have committed to such a frenetic and haphazard project.
One is hopeful when the director and co-writer is Nora Ephron, who played a major part in reviving romantic comedy with ``Sleepless in Seattle'' and ``When Harry Met Sally. . . .''
For ``Mixed Nuts,'' she's assembled a dream cast of comedians and a promising situation: a team of flaked-out social workers answering suicide hotlines in the kooky atmosphere of Venice Beach, Calif.
But Ephron and her sister Delia, who wrote the script, seem to have missed all the comic possibilities.
What's missing from ``Mixed Nuts'' is warmth. Instead, it offers only mean-spirited energy. The director allows her cast to run wild in a scattershot search for laughs. They're merely irritable crazies who have gone over the edge.
The humor is meant to be dark: The script is adapted from a French film called ``Le Pere Noel est une ordure'' (``Santa Claus Is Garbage'').
One of the ``comedic'' touches is a dead body hidden in a Christmas tree. (His head is stuck in the stand.) Then there's a wallflower (Rita Wilson) who moans about being lonely. She lives with her mother and sits in the bathtub, fully clothed, when life gets too rough.
Adding more woe is a dysfunctional couple played by Juliette Lewis and Anthony LaPaglia. They yell at each other all the time - although we're supposed to know they're really in love. She is pregnant, and he is a former con who runs around in a Santa suit carrying a gun.
Lewis is one of our kookiest and most interesting young actresses. She is never boring to watch - even here. LaPaglia can be very funny when he's asked to play dumb, droll characters. Here, he is never allowed to be droll - just loud.
An Amazon transvestite with a husky voice shows up and wants to dance with Steve Martin, who just seems to hang around. In a movie year that seems obsessed with transvestites, this entry is the least funny. Liev Schreiber plays the part for poignancy - a mood that is entirely out of step with the rest of the cast.
Among the more irritating residents is a ukulele-strumming delivery boy who sings in falsetto, presumably to imitate Tiny Tim. Adam Sandler, a promising young comic from ``Saturday Night Live'' who was good in the underrated ``Airheads,'' is made to ramble incoherently.
In a silly cameo, Rob Reiner appears as a vet who sometimes treats humans. Robert Klein is a neighbor who seems to be on a doggie walkathon. And Garry Shandling is the villainous landlord who wants to throw out the suicide-call agency and turn the building into a co-op.
Most misused of all is Martin, who is asked to play the good-hearted but light-headed chief of Lifesavers. He is one of our best physical comedians as well as a fine actor. With many more outings like this, though, his career will be in jeopardy.
Only Madeline Kahn's shrill soprano voice seems to fit into the zany style. Kahn, largely unemployed in movies recently, plays Blanche Munchnik, the agency's evil-tempered matron who gets stuck in an elevator and throws fruitcakes at people. The sameness of her routine, though, prompts me to stop mourning the fact that she lost the Oscar race for ``Blazing Saddles'' and ``Paper Moon'' - roles regarded as comic gems in their time.
These outstanding actors apparently trusted Nora Ephron's reputation for wit and sophistication. They shouldn't have. MEMO: MOVIE REVIEW
``Mixed Nuts''
Cast: Steve Martin, Juliette Lewis, Madeline Kahn, Rita Wilson, Garry
Shandling, Robert Klein, Anthony LaPaglia, Rob Reiner, Adam Sandler,
Liev Schreiber
Director: Nora Ephron
Screenplay: Nora Ephron and Delia Ephron
MPAA rating: PG-13
Mal's rating: one and a half stars
Locations: Movies 10 in Chesapeake; Janaf and Main Gate in Norfolk;
Kemps River, Lynnhaven 8 and Surf-N-Sand in Virginia Beach by CNB