Review
BRINGING DOWN THE HOUSE
Starring Steve Martin and Queen Latifah
Directed by Adam Shankman
Opens Friday, March 7
Ebony and ivory don’t quite live together in perfect harmony in Steve Martin’s latest contribution to the black-versus-white fish-out-of-water film.
Peter Sanderson (Martin) is a divorced suburban dad who doesn’t have time for his kids. Charlene Morton (Queen Latifah) is a self-made ex-con who liberated herself from prison. The two meet online, but Peter is surprised when he finds that Charlene isn’t the tall, wafer-thin girl in the photo she posted, but rather the 200-pound convict being carted off to jail in the background.
When they meet in person, Peter is surprised and kicks her out, but after breaking back into the house, Charlene manages to blackmail him into (a) not calling the police, (b) clearing her wrongfully convicted ass and (c) letting her stay at the house until her name is cleared. How she blackmailed him is too dumb to remember. Sorry.
Most of this movie features Martin playing Martin: bumbling, snow-white and putzy. This performance is contrasted with Queen Latifah acting like the stereotypical over-the-top black diva. Once you realize that the grinding black-on-white awkwardness is the whole point of the film, it’s easy to roll with it.
The story progresses simply, with Peter learning from Charlene how to loosen up and relate to his kids, and that homies just want their props from everyone, be they dawg, biatch or cracker. At the end of it all, despite being 10 IQ points dumber, you realize – in a happy, dumb way – that we’re all alike on the inside. What a surprise.
Dan Aykroyd and Eddie Murphy pioneered the black-and-white switcheroo in Trading Places in 1983. This film plays on that same idea, with a few new ideas and an occasional laugh. Don’t worry about busting a gut, though. |
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