Left of Cool

There is a possibility that the world will never end and that movies like Be Cool will continue to be made forever. Thankfully, for those of us who don't particularly like the sound of that, there is a theory that one day the earth will explode, killing all of humanity in one large “apocalypse.” But with a distinct lack of raining frogs in the forecast for the next few days, it seems likely that tomorrow will arrive without incident, and for the next month or so millions of Americans will be afflicted with a crippling virus innocuously titled Be Cool. Among the many questions Be Cool raises: Who decided that Aerosmith is still hot enough to warrant screen time? Who injected Cedric the Entertainer’s onscreen posse with Jason Giambi’s left-over steroids? And what happened to John Travolta’s neck?

The premise of Be Cool, a sequel to the vastly superior Get Shorty, is that Chili Palmer, mobster-turned-movie producer, has decided to leave the movie industry in favor of the hip-hop music scene. He is lucky enough to immediately discover a “raw talent,” the clearly lip-synching Linda Moon (Christina Milian). Unfortunately Linda is officially under contract to Raji (Vince Vaughn), and wild fun ensues!

Just like 2004's useless sequel Ocean’s Twelve, Be Cool assumes that moviegoers can be satisfied by watching stars sleepwalk through stale material. The timing of the name-brand cast (Travolta, Uma Thurman, Harvey Keitel, Danny DeVito and Vaughn) is so bad that even Keanu Reeves would make the movie funnier. The stagnant feel is due, in part, to horrific editing, which inserts awkward periods of silence after each “joke,” practically begging the audience to laugh. When they don't, the movie grinds to a halt, if it ever had any momentum to begin with.

No rock has been left unturned in the search for generic humor. At one point, Thurman's character recounts a story of Russian gangsters to Cedric the Entertainer and his mob. At the conclusion of the story, Cedric and his group bust out in laughter. Slowly but surely, all but one of the group stops laughing. Yes, that's right, the joke is that one member of the posse laughs too long. If you haven’t already left the theater in disgust, there’s more transparent Hollywood drivel in store for you: The Black Eyed Peas make a self-promoting appearance as Thurman and Travolta shimmy on the dance floor (an obvious and unnecessary homage to Pulp Fiction), and Raji’s boss obnoxiously slurps on a conspicuously labeled Jamba Juice smoothie whenever he appears.

There are two slightly redeeming aspects of the movie: One of the most annoying characters in recent cinema history is introduced and killed within the first five minutes, and Vince Vaughn is occasionally funny as Raji, the white record agent who thinks he’s a black gangster. The film’s only other appealing quality is that director F. Gary Gray has mercifully kept its running time shorter than say, Fellini’s three-hour La Dolce Vita. Why La Dolce Vita, you may ask? According to the press notes, Gray was attempting to create a “hip-hop La Dolce Vita” with Be Cool. Yikes! Bring on the apocalypse.