White Chicks (2004)
Directed by Keenen Ivory Wayans
Two FBI agent brothers, Marcus and Kevin Copeland, accidentally foil a drug bust. To avoid being fired they accept a mission escorting a pair of socialites to the Hamptons--but when the girls are disfigured in a car accident, they refuse to go. Left without options, Marcus and Kevin decide to pose as the sisters, transforming themselves from black men into rich white women.
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12 films that influenced White Chicks
What critics say influenced White Chicks
The army of writers were clearly using Some Like It Hot as a blueprint, so even when Kevin is a man on the prowl, he's pretending to be someone else.
Two such subplots are lifted from Some Like It Hot.
Nods to everything from Some Like It Hot to Soul Man are here in abundance, but with a tangled and pointless plot that redefines vapidity, they’re the gag writer’s equivalent of sprinkles on a doughnut hole, an empty treat for the cinematic bulimics in the audience.
Using the "Some Like It Hot" boilerplate, an army of writers reheat gender-bending slapstick with middling results.
Essentially a macho version of the Joe E. Brown character in "Some Like It Hot," he plays a swaggering, narcissistic football star who won't take "no" for an answer from blonde Marlon.
The Wayans Brothers' latest endeavor (Keenan is at the helm and all three brothers helped pen the script) borrows judiciously from just about every film that has ever featured cross dressing leading men, from Some Like It Hot all the way down to Tootsie, not to mention a generous nod to Eddie Murphy's classic SNL "white infiltration" skit.
However, as I prefer to do, you can chuck all those edgy jokes out the window (they’re not so edgy they’d dent the lawn) and take it as one man’s sublimely transgressive homage to French director George Franju’s iconic 1959 classic Eyes Without a Face.
They don't even look quite human, and I kept being reminded of nothing so much as Peter Lorre in the disguise that covers his fire-scarred visage in The Face Behind the Mask.
Their layers-of-latex Caucasian drag isn't any more realistic than the rubber mask worn by Michael Myers in the "Halloween" movies -- only tighter, as if their faces had been shrink-wrapped.
I thought frequently of the blank-looking mask Michael Myers wore in the “Halloween” films.
The Wayans brothers look like they’re wearing old masks from the “Halloween” films.
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The difference is in Tootsie, Mrs. Doubtfire, and even 1991's True Identity is that the lead characters were actors trying to advance their career, spend more time with their children, or hide out from a Mafioso.
In the summer of 1986, George Lucas withheld images from his forthcoming movie, Howard the Duck, which built up breathless anticipation over just how the feathered hero was going to look.
Apart from some inspired scenes in I’m Gonna Git You Sucka and Don’t Be a Menace to South Central While Drinking Your Juice in the Hood, their mocking of popular culture grows tired fast.
Eldest brother Keenen Ivory Wayans, cowriter of 1987's Hollywood Shuffle with Robert Townshend, broke out as director, writer, and star of the hilarious blaxploitation pastiche I'm Gonna Git You Sucka in 1988.
When Alicia Silverstone did this in Clueless, it was hilarious and even when Jamie Pressly and Carmen Electra spoofed this in spoofs, it is funny, but the Wayans couldn’t get me to laugh.
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Fortunately, Crews (also in the recent Baadasssss!) provides the movie's only silver lining.
The playboy is played by the very funny Terry Crews, of "Baadasssss!" and "Soul Plane," who seems to be spending his year stealing scenes in neo-blaxploitation movies.
Marlon, Shawn, and Keenen Ivory Wayans, who directs "White Chicks" -- and barely -- also made the first two installments of "Scary Movie," which showed us white popular culture through black eyes.
Director Keenen Ivory Wayans ("Scary Movie") undercuts most of the jokes by greenlighting make-up that keeps us from suspending disbelief at nearly every turn.
Marlon and Shawn Wayans of "Scary Movie" fame underwent hours of makeup each day to play the title characters in the gimmick comedy "White Chicks," but little good it did them.
There are also copious nods to recent teen flicks like Bring It On and Save the Last Dance, which all smack of the Wayans' double run on the Scary Movie franchise, but are far less inspired.
Considering the stars of "White Chicks" and its director (older brother Keenen Ivory Wayans) are the same crew responsible for the hilariously in-your-face blockbuster "Scary Movie," their latest comedy is rather tame by comparison.
Even the first two “Scary Movie” installments were pretty good with him at the helm.