Rating: ★★★½ (3.5/5)
Sinbad in the (brick) house!!
This movie is a staple of my childhood. I went to see this in the theatre with my mom and the scene where Sinbad sees the McDonald’s and runs to it in slow motion nearly broke her down laughing. Her laugh lives rent free in my head.
It’s a simple plot. A guy who owes a bunch of money to some loan sharks runs for cover and ends up faking the identity of a long lost friend of a wealthy family man. The shenanigans that ensure are made all the better thanks to Sinbad and Phil Hartman’s amazing chemistry. They are so much fun on screen together. Phil Hartman was a treasure and seeing him in something like this makes me all the more sad that we were denied more of his work. He was murdered in the late 90s.
There are so many little joys in this movie. Sinbad having to pretend to be a vegetarian, giving a career day speech when he doesnt’ even know what his job is supposed to be, coming up with all kinds of meanings for the GFH anagram at a big party, and just lying constantly to try to stay in good graces of this family. He does the wonderful 90s trope of actually being the best thing that happens to this family when he gives everyone advice on how to live better or happier. It’s the kind of thing that only happens in these kinds of movies. It’s very John Hughes in that way, despite him never having been anywhere close to this movie. You can’t help but see the inspiration of Uncle Buck all over this thing.
I watched this with my son, but he lost interest pretty fast. I don’t know if it truly holds up these days, but I do know that he laughed some. For me, I chuckled the whole way through. The scene with the novacaine hands at the dentist was not new by any stretch, but it was still fun to watch Sinbad work through it in his way.
You dont’ see a lot of family comedies like this nowadays and I’m glad to be able to look back at this and rewatch it with the same joy that I had the first time. A Christmas hasn’t gone by where I haven’t sung the “load the grill with fatty meat” song that Phil and Sinbad sing at the end of it.
It’s worth your time if you never watched it.