Gigli

written and directed by Martin Brest

starring Ben Affleck, Jennifer Lopez, Justin Bartha, Al Pacino and Christopher Walken

 

Gigli is not the worst movie ever made, nor is it the worst movie of the year.  It doesn’t even come close to being as bad as the paraded opinion of the critical bandwagon.  It isn’t good, by any means, in fact most of the film is stupid, insulting, offensive, infantile, awkward, confused and nauseatingly narcissistic, yet its not much different than a majority of comedies released these days.

The setup of Gigli is quite preposterous.  Larry Gigli (Affleck) and “Ricki” (Lopez) are two of the most unbelieveable gangsters ever to grace celluloid, and because they are both infamous in their reputations as screwups, they are paired up, despite the importance and difficulty of their assignment.  The scheme of checks and balances their boss sets up is disastrous since they have little in common aside from enormous self-love and lack of teamwork.  Their job is to kidnap Brian (Bartha), the mentally-challenged brother of a federal prosecutor who has been making trouble for a big-time mob boss (Pacino).  Brian is not tied up nor treated like a victim at all.  The three eat dinner and spend time together like a dysfunctional family, going from spite and malice to love and understanding by film’s end. 

Once everything is introduced and established and accepted for being some distant dimension where reality exists in a much different plane than found on Earth, the movie has a pitiful charm like that of an intergalactic petting zoo.  Though a voyeur could not like or be interested in any of the obnoxious characters, there is still an intrigue into what kind of nonsense may come next, whether its in the form of another monologue by a main character on their sexual preference (not orientation) or another monologue by a random character with little or no significance to the story.

Gigli is like a mentally-challenged person.  They can be funny, intentionally or not and regardless, people will always feel discomfort in their decision to laugh.  People don’t want to enjoy or find amusement in the movie because it is not socially acceptable to do so.  Other recent movies have the equivalency of a thirteen-year-old boy, immature and disgusting and socially accepted as such.  Yet, people aren’t being as polite with Gigli as they might with be with a misfortunate human being, especially those showing their ignorance by pronouncing it incorrectly.  They would rather treat it like a freak or a monster, wielding torches and pitchforks in their critiques. 

Sure Gigli is annoying and you want to cover your face in embarrassment watching a lot of what goes on.  The score is constantly inappropriate, giving mixed signals for how to feel at any given moment.  Still, I felt sorry for it.  I wanted to give it a big hug and tell it that everything is ok, despite it not fitting in. But it is a movie, not a person, one that I think has an audience out there to give it some acceptance.  Even Serving Sara had an audience.   I would rather watch Gigli  any day over a film that still thinks stepping in cow shit is funny or a film that stages extreme situations involving people walking in on characters doing something that looks embarrassingly like something else.

Don’t get me wrong.  I didn’t really like Gigli nor would I recommend it to anyone I respect.  I do, however recommend it to that majority of America that continually attends movies that are ten times worse.  With anonymity available in online video renting or purchasing, these people who are afraid they might like something they’ll be ridiculed for, should give it a chance.