Latex Movie Review: Mr Magoo

The animation studio UPA ( United Productions of America ) was founded by animators after a nasty strike with the Disney studios. They cut a break when cheapo studio Columbia Pictures commissioned them to produce cartoon shorts they could distribute along with their Three Stooges shorts. One of those was the 1949 cartoon Ragtime Bear, an unremarkable short about a bear who discovers a banjo and begins playing it. The standout character in the short was the bear's nemesis, a cranky old man with poor vision named Magoo ( voiced by popular character actor Jim Backus ) who was constantly mistaking the bear for his nephew. Magoo stole the short, and soon more than 50 other Mr Magoo shorts were released by Columbia during the '50s. As the Magoo character evolved he grew more popular until Columbia commissioned a full length Magoo feature 1001 Arabian Nights. Shortly after the release of that film Columbia discontinued distributing shorts. UPA still owned the Magoo character and decided to produce cheaper made for television cartoons. 1960s The Mr Magoo Show is probably the best remembered incarnation of the character as the theatrical shorts were withheld from television syndication for decades. Here UPA introduced the character Charley, Magoo's Chinese manservant who basically replaced Magoo's nephew Waldo. Magoo was every bit as successful on television as he was in the theaters, but television networks were only interested in purchasing a single season worth of animated cartoons they would repeat over and over again for the next few years. To keep the character alive UPA produced the first ever television Christmas special called Mr Magoo's Christmas Carol. In it Magoo performs in a staged production of the classic Christmas story, and aside from the opening with the usual Magoo mayhem as he makes his way to the theater, the rest of the special Magoo was completely out of character as he performed his role of Scrooge as if he had perfect sight. The Christmas special did well enough that UPA launched a new series, Famous Adventures of Mr Magoo, where each week he portrayed a character from classic literature. Once again the Magoo character was not blind while portraying characters such as Sherlock Holmes and Robin Hood. In the mid '70s UPA revived the series again with a show called What's New Mr. Magoo, where he was teemed up with a talking bulldog who was also blind.

And then Magoo disappeared. No new cartoon series, no new specials, no new movies and the old cartoons no longer in syndication. The only exception being his Christmas Carol special which still occasionally aired in syndication. It was assumed that Magoo was too politically incorrect and would never be seen again. After all, the comedy in each cartoon was derived from Magoo's blindness. That is until Disney Studios announced they were going to produce a live action film version in 1997. This they did complements of a disclaimer at the end of the movie stating that blind people really do not act like Magoo. There, that should satisfy the politically correct police, right? Strangely enough the live action version of Mr Magoo flew right under their radar. The only real question was this live version of Mr Magoo as good as the original cartoon version? The movie itself allows you to make the comparison. The first few minutes comprising the opening credits is a cartoon featuring Magoo, complete with a near perfect imitation of the late Jim Backus' voice, up to his usual nearsighted hijinks. Maybe not as good as the original cartoons, but close enough in quality. The credits end and the cartoon Magoo morphs into Leslie Nielsen and the live action movie. Big mistake. Nielsen looks nothing like the cartoon Magoo, more noticeably around the head where he had not been shaved bald as the cartoon Magoo was. Neilsen does his best at recreating Magoo's voice and cadence, but it only ends up sounding like a bad Jim Backus imitation. The contrast between cartoon Magoo and live action Magoo stops the movie dead and wrecks any possible suspension of belief we may have given Nielsen for his portrayal. Magoo is the rich owner of a fish cannery who is sponsoring an exhibit of The Star of Kuristan, a rare giant ruby on loan from the country of Kuristan. Accompanying the ruby is Stacy Sampanahodrita, an ambassador or princess or something played by Jennifer Garner long before she became a household name on Alias. She becomes the object of desire of Magoo's nephew Waldo ( Matt Keeslar ) who spends most of the movie chasing after her. Their romantic subplot seems to have been shoehorned into the movie, adds nothing to the overall plot, and was probably the result of the screenwriters having no other idea what to do with the Waldo character. A pair of jewelry thieves ( Kelly Lynch and Nick Chinlund ) steal the ruby, an inevitably lose it while fighting over it on a ship where it drops into the tackle box of Magoo who is fishing in his boat below. Magoo has no clue the ruby is in his possession, nor any idea that two federal agents ( Ernie Hudson and Stephen Tobolowsky ) suspect it was Magoo who stole the ruby and have him under surveillance.

The first half of the movie is exactly what you would expect from a Mr Magoo story, and was similar to the plots you would find in one of his cartoons. The writers got the first half right, but then it all falls apart for the second half of the movie. The ruby is retrieved by one of the thieves, after which Magoo finally becomes aware of the situation. He decides to go after the ruby to clear his name, masquerading as a gangster named Ortega Peru to infiltrate a conclave in Europe where the Star of Kuristan is being auctioned off. At this point the movie stops being Mr Magoo and instead becomes more like an Inspector Clouseau film. Once Magoo begins impersonating Ortega his poor vision seems to disappear. Magoo spends much of the second half of the movie globetrotting after the stolen ruby and helping to nab two wanted international criminals ( Malcolm McDowell and Miguel Ferre ). This is nothing like the Mr Magoo cartoons where he would have been clueless to the ruby for the remainder of the film and would have nabbed the thieves by happenstance, also clueless to what was going on. The writers of this movie had no idea how to pull this off so instead reinvent Magoo to fit into a formula ending. The second half of this film is an abomination, but I can't even recommend the first half. Somehow the Magoo sight gags that worked so well as a cartoon fall flat as a live action version. As pointed out Nielsen's portrayal of Magoo wears out it's welcome almost immediately. And typical of Disney films from that period the musical score is annoying. Too much reliance went to action gags, and to that Disney hired Hong Kong director Stanley Tong who previously directed the Jackie Chan hits Rumble in the Bronx and Supercop. The problem was that while Tong was credited for the direction of those films it was really Jackie Chan and his stunt team that directed and choreographed the action scenes in those films. Tong does not give Mr Magoo the flair of a Hong Kong action movie, which is probably what Disney wanted when they hired him. Mr Magoo is disappointing on all fronts. I suggest that you rent the original cartoons instead.

THE SCENE:
The only possible reason to want to rent Mr Magoo is to see Kelly Lynch in a black latex catsuit ( along with fake black wig and painted on burglar mask ). She wears it while stealing the Star of Kuristan from the museum, the theft beginning at 7 minutes. It is a nice long scene which has Kelly dropping down from the roof by wire, swinging around to take out the surveillance cameras, crouching on the top of a pterodactyl replica while hiding from the guards, and doing other things you would expect from a burglar. It is not a full latex catsuit as I detected the bottom half of the leggings to be made of a different non-shiny material, but is sexy regardless. She can be seen in another catsuit, this time silver metallic, at 55 minutes. Unfortunately she is in this scene very briefly. She can also be seen wearing a white satin bikini and sheer white wrap around skirt beginning at 50 minutes ( barely noticeable at first as she is blending into the background, but more obvious as the scene plays out )