Wednesday, March 07, 2007
The Blues Brothers
***** The Blues Brothers. Comedy.
Directed by: John Landis
Starring: John Belushi, Dan Ackroyd
Watched this with the boys on video while Carl was away last month. After We're No Angels, they requested a laugh-aloud comedy, and I decided they were old enough to appreciate this comedy classic despite its R rating.
When Jake and Elwood Blues are reunited after Jake's stint in Joliet, Jake finds that the beloved Bluesmobile has been replaced by a former City of Mount Prospect police car, and the Blues Brothers Band has been disbanded.
They visit "the penguin," the nun who runs the orphanage where they grew up, only to find that the orphanage will be shut down unless they come up with $5000 in back taxes. Since she vetoes any suggestion of ill-gotten gains, Jake comes up with a plan: put the band back together.
From then on it's non-stop action, laughs, and music, as they're "on a mission from God" to collect the former band members one by one, equip them, then try to get enough gigs to earn the money. Along the way, they also collect quite a trail of people out to get them: a mystery woman armed with everything from a bazooka to a flamethrower, Illinois Nazis, a country-western band, as well as the cops.
Star-studded doesn't begin to cover the casting, either. It's practically a who's who of rhythm and blues, as well as immediately recognizable actors. Check the IMDB link for the list.
As with Blazing Saddles, the humor is hilarious without being pointless. Maybe I'm showing my age, but the boys agreed, and it's something we've discussed about other movies as well. In this case, nobody's safe from being skewered by humor, and everything's a target: relationships, crime, racism, poverty, country music, etc., etc. It's no surprise that The Blues Brothers' roots are in the original irreverent TV show (no, not South Park. Not even The Simpsons. Sheesh. Babies.). I'll avoid ranting about how it became a pale shadow of itself.
Anyway, it's a classic that I never get tired of, and I'm not a very patient person when it comes to re-watching movies, so that's saying something. Plus, it's fun to send the boys off to school in the morning with "remember, you're on a mission from God." (Okay, maybe that's just fun for me.)
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Categories: Movies, 5stars, Comedy
Labels: 5 stars, comedy, Movies
