Coneheads

Starring: Dan Aykroyd, Jane Curtin, David Spade, Eddie Griffin, Sinbad, Phil Hartman, Adam Sandler, Michael McKean, Drew Carey, Jason Alexander, Joey Lauren Adams, Parker Posey, Chris Farley, Kevin Nealon, Tim Meadows, Ellen DeGeneres, Tom Arnold, Jon Lovitz
Directed by: Steve Barron
Rating: PG
Genre: Comedy, Science Fiction
1993

Times Seen:
Tim: 1

Summary: An alien couple (Dan Aykroyd, Jane Curtin) come to Earth and try to live undetected, despite the fact that they have giant cone heads.

Review:

Tim: Coneheads is a pretty terrible movie. Despite assembling a very impressive cast, there's just not much here. So many Saturday Night Live skits fail to make the transition to the big screen because what's funny for five minutes is rarely funny over an entire feature film.

The whole Saturday Night Live movie attempts actually got off to a great start. Their first movie was the immortal classic, The Blues Brothers, followed by the solid Wayne's World. Coneheads is where things started to fall apart. This was the first misstep, but there would be many more to follow. The problems are legion- the movie isn't funny, the whole premise is weak and it's stretched way past its limit. The films feels like it's more focused on shoving in as many comedian cameos as possible, rather than trying to tell any semblance of a story. This is quite simply a bad movie in just about every arena. The whole premise doesn't make much sense. You have these aliens with massive cone heads assimilating into American culture. And no one knows they're aliens, despite their heads and stunningly bizarre behavior. And guess what? That's the joke- no one knows they are aliens! That right there is the summation of this idea. That's what is supposed to be funny. But guess what? The world doesn't work like that. It's not funny because the whole concept is idiotic. Does anyone know what America is like? If a family of people with massive cone-shaped heads showed up, people wouldn't blindly accept them. Who thinks Americans have that kind of tolerance? I'm sorry to crack on America here, but this country has a long history of intolerance and fear of anything different. Americans in 1993 would have reacted strongly to aliens like this living among us- just not the way depicted in this moronic version. That's the heart of the issue. They are trying to make something that's not very funny into a comedy. Surprise, surprise- it doesn't work.

I suppose I have to give the cast some (some) credit. Dan Aykroyd and Jane Curtin are certainly all in for these roles. There's no hesitation- they fully embrace these characters and try their best to sell it. I give them credit for not having one-foot-in and one-foot-out. They fully commit to these roles. Unfortunately, the roles make them both look terrible. Despite their efforts, it's hard to not to cringe at their performances. It's fun to see David Spade, Adam Sandler, Michael McKean, Drew Carey, Chris Farley, and all the others- it was genuinely fun to see them. But it was disruptive and ultimately pointless. It's as if the producers knew there wasn't enough story here to support a 1 hour, 28 minute movie, so they were hoping a whole lot of cameos would cover that up. It doesn't. And, the end result is that you have a lot of actors showing up briefly to go down with a sinking ship. I give the cast credit for showing up, but man, there's not much to like with what we get.

Coneheads is just a stupid movie. It might be the first misstep for Saturday Night Live movies, but it would set a precedent that most of them would follow.

Rating 1-10
Tim's Rating: 4



If You Enjoyed This Movie, We Recommend: The Blues Brothers, Wayne's World