Blu-ray Review: Meet Dave [2008]
Reviewed by Johnny McNair
Fox Home Entertainment– 90 minutes – 2008 – Rated PG-13 – 1080p 1.85:1 – DTS HD 5.1 Lossless Audio
What the hell happened to Eddie Murphy? When I was a kid I loved this guy because he made good films like Beverly Hills Cop, 48 Hours, Coming to America, and I’ll even give it to him for Boomerang. He was once the biggest star on the map, and now it seems that every film he’s made in the last few years (with the exception of Dream Girls) is career suicide. You would think he would have learned from mistakes like Daddy Day Care and Norbit, but now he has fallen to his lowest point, yes even lower than Pluto Nash, with a train wreck of a film called Meet Dave, which is now available on Blu-ray from Fox Home Entertainment. Mr. Murphy if you have any respect for your place in the history of cinema, you need to immediately fire your agent, manager, and vow to never work with director Brian Robbins again.
THE MOVIE
This film is not even worth discussing, so let’s keep this short. For those who care, Meet Dave stars Eddie Murphy, once again playing duel roles, the first being the captain of an intergalactic miniature crew, and the other is the starship itself which is a replica of himself that looks like a regular person, but is actually a robot, (I mean spaceship) in disguise, who is dressed in a white suit that resembles Ricardo Montalban’s from the TV show Fantasy Island, the only reference to Earth culture the crew has. Their mission on Earth, in absolute cliché style, is to find an orb that has fallen to Earth and destroy it to save their own planet…Yawn.
So for most of the film Eddie Murphy just walks around making odd faces, looking as if he’s completely embarrassed to be in the movie; and tossed in are silly jokes from the crew of his ship, doing stuff we’ve already seen in comedies like Honey, I Shrunk The Kids. There are no surprises or twists, and if you find yourself laughing at any point, it will be a laugh of disbelief because you can’t believe you’re watching this mess.
Directed by Brian Robbins, who has nothing to offer cinema, because Meet Dave is like watching a bigger version of the TV show Family Matters with Eddie Murphy playing Urkel. Directors like Brett Ratner and Michael Bay always get ripped apart for their movies, but at least those guys understand how to make a movie, and what it takes to entertain an audience. Brian Robbins is not a Director, he is just the equivalent of an auto pilot button, and you just press him when you need a crappy film popped out. Has he evolved as a director since Good Burger? Fuck no! And that was ten years ago.
Meet Dave is aimed at a younger audience, but showing them this film may get you arrested for child abuse. Thankfully movie audiences agreed, making this film one of the biggest bombs of 2008, barely taking in a total of $11 million dollars domestic. Maybe Meet Dave works better if you play a drinking game while watching it, because you can’t sit through this thing sober. Mr. Eddie Murphy, you have a bunch of fans who grew up watching your best work in the 80’s and early 90’s who really, really miss you and want to see you come back to claim your throne as the king of comedy. You still have some clout in Hollywood Eddie, so please use it to demand better scripts for your talents. You’re much better than this.
VIDEO
With full 1080p resolution in a 1.85:1 aspect ratio Meet Dave looks good, but it’s like putting a pile of dogshit in a gift-wrapped box. The film is so bad that even if it image quality is good, it’s very difficult to appreciate it. Meet Dave’s image quality is sharp with nice details, but the overall style of the cinema photography is lame and the pathetic visual effects will not keep you attention for long.
AUDIO
The DTS-HD Lossless 5.1 audio mix is wasted here, because the sound design is not even a step above a TV movie. The dialogue is clear, but and the background noises are satisfactory, but because of the film itself, you may find yourself fast-forwarding through most of it.
EXTRAS
Like the film itself, the bonus features are lame with no director’s audio commentary included, which sucks, because I would have loved to seen Brian Robbins talk his way out of this mess.
The Making of Meet Dave is twenty minutes too long, but funnier than the film itself, because to hear these guys talk about what a great film this is going to be is hilarious.
Four deleted scenes are included that saved you seven minutes more torture it would have taken to watch the film if they were left in.
There’s a three-minute gag reel that may make you gag.
The highlight of the extras is a Fox TV special called “Life After Film School with Brian Robbins.” The first thing he says is that he never went to film school. Judging by his library of work I wouldn’t brag about that. Quentin Tarantino never went to film school either, but he at least he knows and understands how to make a good movie.
BOTTOM LINE
Meet Dave sucks. Don’t buy it, don’t rent it, don’t even say the title out loud or you’ll have nightmares.
SCORES: (out of 5):
The Movie: 2.0
Video: 3.0
Sound: 2.5
Extras: 2.0
Bottom Line: 2.0