Mork goes to singles bar in the comedic 'Planet'
By BILL FUSZ
Scene Movie Critic
The premise of "What Planet Are You From?" – along with most of the dialogue, lighting, scenes and special effects – is bad.
Garry Shandling (television's "The Larry Sanders Show") plays Harold Anderson, an alien from an all-male planet bent on ruling the universe. Grayden (Ben Kingsley), the planet's ruler, decides that the best way to conquer their new target, Earth, is to send one of them to impregnate an Earth woman. Somehow, which is never explained, this will allow the aliens to begin a three-generation takeover from within. After months of performing training simulations of Earth flirtation in an auditorium reminiscent of DeBartolo 101, Harold is chosen as the best suited candidate for the hazardous and unpredictable mission to Earth.
Unfortunately, while the mission may be unpredictable and hazardous to the average alien, the average moviegoer will find it all too predictable and the only danger will be falling asleep. Harold is first transported to an airplane, where his first attempts at flirting with stewardesses consist of lines like, "I like your footwear," and "My, you smell nice." As he makes his way through the airport, his attempts continue to bewilder, scare and generally disgust the women that he meets.
His problems are not limited, however, to poor social etiquette. It seems that as his species has progressed in power and technological know how, other attributes "diminished" to the point of disappearing entirely. Due to this, he is artificially brought up to the Earth-male standard before his deployment. Unfortunately, the bugs weren't completely worked out and now when he is aroused, his prosthesis has a tendency to hum and vibrate at increasing volumes, much to the distress of the women he is trying to establish interplanetary relations with.
This does not mean that he is beyond help though. As a loan officer at a bank in Phoenix, his coworker, Perry Gordon (Greg Kinnear), takes it upon himself to show Harold around town. Gordon is, to say the least, a morally repugnant character. This comes across clearly when he takes Harold to an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting, saying it is a good place to find vulnerable women. Leaving Harold alone to go after a "weeper," Harold finds himself talking to Susan Hart, a recovering alcoholic played by the unfortunately cast Annette Bening ("American Beauty").
Susan is a middle-aged woman who has just woken up from years of partying with musicians to realize that she wants to build a real life. Unfortunately, it seems that her instincts in regards to men are as off as ever, because she picks Harold as the perfect man to run away to Las Vegas with and marry.
From here the movie attempts to change pace and become poignant, identifying the differences between men and women and showing that even aliens have an emotional side. Susan becomes pregnant but disillusioned as she discovers Harold only sees her as a breeder.
Harold has concerns of his own, too. FAA investigator Roland Jones (John Goodman) is quickly closing in on him and his dastardly alien plot. Luckily, for reasons which, once again, are never explained, Harold and Susan's burgeoning fetus reaches full maturity in just under two months, prompting the awe but apparently none of the curiosity of the doctors.
The movie stumbles on a variety of levels, lurching between science fiction parody and a serious attempt to investigate gender relations. In the end, it fails to pull off either attempt.
In the meantime, however, "What Planet Are You From?" resembles nothing more than an extended stand up routine or scattered collection of sophomoric penis jokes. Obviously borrowing from John Gray's "Men Are From Mars, Women Are From Venus," the movie's existence revolves around one of those 3 a.m. dorm conversations: "Hey, what if they really were from...?" This in and of itself is fine. Many great ideas and story lines have begun in roughly the same way. Nichols and Shandling, however, never got beyond that point in conceptualizing the idea. Instead they raided sci-fi backlots, cheap sex humor, and topped it off with cheesy sentimentalism a la "Full House" for a wow finish.
The movie is a dud from start to finish.
The saddest part of all however, is how many good actors and actresses were dragged into this project. Due to the 13th Amendment abolishing slavery, I'm forced to assume it was of their own free will. Shandling had a critically acclaimed television show which garnered more than its fair share of awards during its run. Kinnear ("As Good As It Gets") and Bening have both been nominated for Oscars. Kinglsey played Gandhi and got an Academy Award. Even Goodman ("The Big Lebowski") has a string of Emmys, Golden Globe nominations and other awards for his role on "Roseanne" as well as dramatic roles in television movies.
Yet they all chose to star in this remarkably bad movie. One can only wonder what planet their agents are from.
1 and 1/2 out of 5 shamrocks
All Scene Stories for Thursday, March 9, 2000
