On my iPod (cool), I confess I have one Journey song (uncool). I considered defending it (cool), but the act of explaining why something is or isn't cool is strenuous work (uncool). In fact, the lead of this review of Be Cool, the one you're reading at this moment, by its very nature, is especially uncool. You're aware of the distinction, I'm sure, even if you never considered it much:
By definition, one should not put effort into appearing casual, and, in fact, the entire business of explaining or defining cool or hip - or intentionally creating something intended to be cool or hip - is so self-defeating, that the truly cool never consider it.
Nothing could be less cool.
OK, now what is cool?
For one, The Rock performing Loretta Lynn's "You Ain't Woman Enough" in hot pants and gaudy white fringe, and becoming so convincingly charming - and dropping his trademark pose of seriousness to reveal it's just that: a pose. He never seems to be trying. Not like Be Cool, the sequel to the heartlessly (and joyously) cynical, sweat-free 1995 send-up Get Shorty. Both are based on novels by Elmore Leonard, the legendary crime novelist (who lives in suburban Detroit), and he is cool. His dialogue Ping-Pongs on the page. Reading it is always like playing out a fun movie yet to be made.
So naturally Leonard is like enticing quicksand for a filmmaker. Scott Frank's script for Get Shorty, in fact, was the first of a surprising string of smart Leonard adaptations: Out of Sight (also written by Frank) and Jackie Brown (a rewrite of Rum Punch) being two of the best. Dozens more, though, have fallen into the Leonard quicksand over the years. Take Be Cool. It works hard to look like it can keep a beat (and often does), but doesn't have the effortless rhythm of Get Shorty and feels self-conscious about its failings.
Like when you tell a joke that's not funny and then try to explain it. The most obvious place you notice this is when John Travolta, who returns from Get Shorty, takes a spin on the dance floor with Uma Thurman, as a record label exec trying to break a new act and avoid the mob underworld. The music is from the Black Eyed Peas. The moves are weird and sexy. You're meant to recall their last famous spin, 11 years ago in Pulp Fiction, which does the film no favors: the scene has no bounce, lots of dead space, the pace is choppy.
Director F. Gary Gray, who was nevertheless a good choice after his breezy caper picture The Italian Job, falls in the Leonard quicksand, climbs out, falls in, climbs out. He's not lazy, just off, and Leonard's tone is so singular that a filmmaker who hesitates in his instincts steps on our toes. It's that demanding.
But back to The Rock.
He's a supporting actor here, but since the joy is in the details, not the overall movie, I can almost recommend the picture on the weight of its dribs and drabs. He plays Elliot Wilhelm, the gay bodyguard of Raji (Vince Vaughn), an insecure music mogul who thinks he's black. Elliot wants to be an actor but his only talent is raising one eyebrow (which sounds familiar). His apartment has posters of Moonstruck and Rhinestone, but The Rock (a trademark owned by the World Wrestling Federation; his real name is Dwayne Johnson) doesn't go the old route and reduce him to a swishy stereotype.
He inhabits the role by allowing moments where it appears he doesn't notice the camera is in the room. Elliot's smart, but not smart enough about how show business works to know an audition monologue should be a one-man deal. His sheepishness and lack of awareness ruthlessly tear down how you think action heroes behave. He's as pointed and satiric as Get Shorty was - and as hard as Be Cool is soft.
Elliot, incidentally, also shares the name of the esteemed director of the Detroit Film Theatre at the Detroit Institute of Art; years ago, as part of a DIA auction, Leonard offered a character's name in one of his upcoming books to the highest bidder.
Wilhelm won. Pretty cool, no?
And that 1999 book, Be Cool, like the film, has an air of self-parody. Which can be cool. Chili Palmer (Travolta), a New York shylock uprooted to Los Angeles, has given up the hustle of the movie business for the hustle of the music business, and the film begins with Travolta (in fact, the very first line of dialogue) sneering at the idea of sequels. And already, we feel it sweating.
There s a lot of posing going on, actually; bits of it even fun:
Thurman, who carries herself with a real confi dence, pretends
to be a bigger music exec than she is; Travolta pretends to know
what he s talking about; Harvey Keitel and Vaughn, as partners
in a talent agency, pretend to have the street cred to go along
with their pimp duds; Cedric the Entertainer, as a Suge Knightesque
rap producer educated at the Wharton School, throws an
old NBA jersey on over an oxford when he wants to pretend he s a
gangsta. But the movie industry in Get Shorty was a place where
people were cowed by a posture.
Travolta got by with a sucker punch and an order: Look at
me. When Chili does it here, it sounds more like a whine:
C mon, look at me, focus. Be Cool never does convince us that
the music business would be as naive; the point, in fact, is music
producers and gangsta rappers and real gangsters are all wise
guys, they know the angles. Get Shorty got its mileage from the
sense that Chili, a knee-breaker from way back, really wanted to
make fi lms. There was a dream, an ideal, and it touches everyone.
Nobody in Be Cool sounds quite as enamoured of music,
and neither does the fi lm itself; it s more interested in money.
Chili manages a young Beyonce-like soul singer (Christina
Milian, a real-life Beyonce-like singer), and if only he had the
guts to say what we re all thinking: she s a dime-a-dozen, another
American Idol-wannabe prone to histrionic warbling. If only Be Cool were as ruthless as it pretends. It wouldn t crowd every scene with a dozen actors, but go for the throat. It would play Vaughn more, who blabbers insanely, a biting stab at real-life trend setters: Stop hatin , start participatin . C mon, twinkle, twinkle, baby. Twinkle, twinkle.
If Be Cool had a clue, it d have something to say when Chili gets
his young R&B singer a cameo during an Aerosmith concert. It
might notice the audience that buys Aerosmith is not the same
audience that runs out to buy CDs from new R&B teen sensations.
It might notice there s something extremely uncool about John Travolta, stiff and waxy, hanging out with Aerosmith singer Steven Tyler in a luxury suite and smoking cigars.
What s so uncool about that?
If you have to ask ...
Contact Christopher Borrelli at: cborrelli@theblade.com or 419-724-6117.
First Published March 4, 2005, 1:53 p.m.
