“The Honeymooners” (Paramount Pictures)
Making movies out of old TV series seems to be one of the hot ideas for the summer. Coming our way are (1) “The Dukes of Hazzard” (2) “Bewitched”, and (3) “The Honeymooners” “The Honeymooners” is the first one up to the plate and sorry to say it pops out on the entertainment field. Cedric the Entertainer and Mike Epps are both very funny men but they are not Jackie Gleason and Art Carney.
Remaking the classic CBS sitcom was not a good idea. Reruns of the old show still pop up on television every now and then so people can see the originals – and do it for free. If you are going to pay to see a “Honeymooners” movie it had better be a good one, and this new movie version is below average.
Cedric plays Ralph Cramden, a city bus driver and a schemer of get rich quick ideas. The movie opens with him meeting Alice (Gabrielle Union) and falling in love. Soon the couple is living in an apartment building where Ed Norton (Epps) and his wife Trixie (Regina Hall) also live.
Ralph is constantly coming up with “get rich quick” ideas that drive his wife crazy. What she wants to do is work hard and earn enough money to buy a house of their own. When she finds the ideal place she knows she has enough movie stashed back to make the down payment, but then she learns that Ralph has spent it on some fool idea. Now he has to come up with a really quick scheme to get the money back.
Unlike the efforts of the TV guys, the actions of Ralph and Norton in this movie reek of desperation and stupidity. They ought to know better than to get into jams like they do but they keep doing the same silly things over and over.
Cedric the Entertainer is a good choice to play Ralph. He is a very funny, slightly overweight man. He doesn’t try to imitate Gleason in any way and that’s a wise move. Epps does try at times to be Carney-esque, and doesn’t succeed. The film is best when you can forget Gleason and Carney’s performances and just concentrate on the film and forget its “The Honeymooners.”
Coming off better than the male actors are the females. Union and Hall are sassy and sensational as Alice and Trixie. They have good chemistry together and also with the men playing their husbands.
The movie is rated PG-13 for profanity and mild violence.
With TV series like “The Honeymooners,” the original actors are embedded in our minds. Hollywood would be better off to go with an original idea than try to remake the classics of television.
I scored “The Honeymooners” a divorced 4 out of 10.
