Spaceballs (1987)
I am your father's brother's nephew's cousin's former roommate!
THE SUMMARY: A heroic mercenary and his half-man half-dog best friend seek to rescue the princess from the grips of the evil empire in a parody much more cringey and pointless than even the worst Star Wars embarrassments of Jar Jar-ian magnitude (to borrow the Comic Book Guy line). I love Star Wars, but I’m not so protective that I reflexively reject any mockery of it. The opposite, actually. I was looking forward to seeing Star Wars ruthlessly ridiculed. What makes Spaceballs suck balls is it doesn’t - it’s a very poor job of mocking the easily mockable. If you came for good Star Wars jokes, you’ll be disappointed. If you came for any good jokes at all, you’ll still be disappointed. See Family Guy’s trilogy for infinitely better Star Wars parody.
FROM MOVIE-PICKER ‘THE HOUSE ALWAYS WINS’: A Mel Brooks classic, it mocks many of the tropes of the ‘Star’ movies of the era and features many one-liners.
JAMIE AND JEANNE’S SHOW AI ART FOR THE WEEK:
We’ll try digital blackface and an Elon Musk cameo in pursuit of the hitpiece this week.
THE BEST:
Like two or three funny jokes: I smirked momentarily at the reference to the sequel, Spaceballs 2: The Search for More Money. I’ll award an extra point for not actually making it, so I’ll never have to watch it. The bit about watching the movie in real time had moments of cleverness, until they abandoned the obvious way to use it by peeking into the future, which any evil genius would do. The callback on the idiot’s luggage combination was alright, but it’s not enough to sustain what’s supposed to be an entire scene of comedy. Note the theme here: for every step forward, there’s at least one back. In most cases, it’s no steps forward, and a dozen or so back. A great joke needle buried in a haystack of monotony would be far too kind a metaphor for this movie. Forget combing the desert for the princess - they’re combing the desert for a decent line, and likewise, they ain’t found shit.
Pizza the Hutt is a pretty good effect: The Pizza the Hutt costume is actually pretty legit. Dripping cheese, dropping pepperoni, a gross tongue, and despite the mess, still a recognizably Jabba-esque appearance. It all works beyond just his pun name. The problem is, the character gets all of two minutes of screen time: his introduction demanding his money, and a brief news story about his death. He deserved more. They tried so hard on this costume, and so little on John Candy as Barf. Barf looks like an overly enthusiastic ‘dog dad’ at your neighborhood Halloween party. Pizza the Hutt was high-effort and memorable.
They’re combing for entertainment, actually.
Cool effect, underused
THE WORST:
How do you skip the main Star Wars character?: I get it - I’m not gonna have a lightsaber shoved so far up my ass that I demand every Star Wars character is represented for a proper parody, but really? How do you not have a Luke Skywalker character? You don’t make a parody and omit the protagonist - it’s preposterous. Especially when he could have been named Puke Skywalker, to keep with the ‘barf’ theme.
Likewise, there’s no R2D2 or Obi-Wan. Mandatory? No. Missed opportunities? Especially when they opted for so many pointless characters otherwise, yes.
Painfully dull bits that don’t even have anything to do with Star Wars anyway: I love a good dad joke as much as the next guy, but everyone has their limits. There are just too many groan-for-groan’s sake bits that are lame, boring, and not Star Wars-related. Haha - I get it. The radar is jammed by actual jam. Haha - I get it. The guys are named Asshole. Haha - I get it. His helmet is bigger than a helmet of usual size (though Norm McDonald as Burt Reynolds did make this premise kinda funny once).
None of these bits are particularly clever beyond a simple double-meaning, but that double-meaning in these cases and many others has no Star Wars relevance at all. As a Star Wars fan, I looked forward to seeing Star Wars mocked, with Star Wars jokes that someone who knows the movies would understand and appreciate. Instead, Spaceballs is mostly lame dad jokes and even lamer bathroom humor that anybody would get without even seeing the subject movie, making the parody mostly irrelevant.
It’s short, and somehow still way too long: I will thank the Spaceballs producers for only subjecting me to 90 minutes, but even that drags on far too long. The horrendous intro about how big the ship is (I get it - it’s very big), the boring and unfunny wedding scene at the end that isn’t even a part of the Star Wars movies anyway, the stupid Planet of the Apes bit - there’s at least fifteen minutes that could still be shaved from this movie without losing anything central to the story or its alleged ‘comedy.’
The Schwartz! Get it? It half-rhymes with the Force, and he says it very Druishly, which also rhymes.
THE RATING: 1/5 Wickies. A miserable mockery of mockeries - it hardly does its only job: make fun of Star Wars. Wouldn’t it be funny if the lightsabers were penises? Not really, no.
YOUR RATING: Vote here ⬇ Note: if you get a notification saying you have already voted and you haven’t, this is because of an issue with iOS (Apple mobile devices). Try voting on a desktop or laptop computer.
NEXT WEEK: Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World (2003)
AFTER THAT? YOU PICK - VOTE! September’s nominations are from listener ‘TheHouseAlwaysWins.’ Note: if you get a notification saying you have already voted and you haven’t, this is because of an issue with iOS (Apple mobile devices). Try voting on a desktop or laptop computer.
Want to be the movie nominator for the month? Here’s how - fill out the form below. Note: once you are entered, you are eligible for selection on an ongoing basis. One entry per participant - multiple entries will be rejected.