SCOOBY DOO
Released: June 14, 2002
"Scooby Doo" has surprisingly even less life and purpose than my penis. Despite earning more than $54 million on it's opening domestic weekend, the movie lacks the good-natured fun of its animated counterpart from the 70s, 80s and early 90s. Directed by former Hollywood film editor Raja Gosnell, who edited films like "Home Alone", "Pretty Woman" and "Mrs. Doubtfire". The John Hughes protoge made a name for himself by directing "Home Alone 3", "Never Been Kissed" and "Big Momma's House". For this big live action version of "Scooby Doo", Gosnell hired Freddie Prinze Jr, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Matthew Lillard and Mr. Bean himself - Rowan Atkinson. The plot is immaterial - just imagine a typical "Scooby" cartoon plot but remove any joy for life. Roger Ebert was right - there seems to be a predominantly large amount of large breasted female cast members. In fact, only Gellar seems to have "normal" sized mammaries here. There's plenty of scantily clad bodies, considering it's a movie geared for kids. Add in a few needless up-skirt panty shots for no explicable reason and voila! - here's your big budget "Scooby Doo" in live action format. The plot and spirit of fun aside, it must be mentioned that the computer animated Scooby never really meshes with the live action going on around it. You are ALWAYS aware the actors are permorming in front of a dog that clearly doesn't exist. Maybe the kids will "get" this better than me but I still feel more entertained by the Hanna Barbera cartoons of yore than this contemporary model... The one plus is the movie's fleeting running time. Any longer and I woulld have puked up my "topping not butter" coated popcorn.
20th Century Fox
86 Minutes