8-30-04

The other day, I was talking to my brother about the huge number of movies that were released every year, and the fact that, ten years from now, maybe 1% of them will be remembered. For example, who here remembers Celtic Pride starring Damon Wayans and Daniel Stern? Bulletproof starring Damon Wayans and Adam Sandler? Bushwhacked starring, you guessed it, Daniel Stern and Jon Polito? More recently, how about Joe Somebody starring Tim Allen? Or 3000 Miles to Graceland starring Kevin Costner and Kurt Russell?

This lead my brother to describe what he calls One Night At McCool's Syndrome (ONAMS for short). ONAMS is the phenomenon wherein a movie is made starring very popular actors, often at the height of their popularity, that are completely forgotten almost as soon as they're released. How many of you actually saw One Night At McCool's? How about Gone Fishin', starring the then popular Joe Pesci (fresh out of Home Alone) and Danny Glover (fresh out of Lethal Weapon 3)? 8 Heads in a Duffel Bag, again with Pesci and also including David "Chris Farley's sidekick" Spade, who was at the height of his carrer, having recently made Tommy Boy. Or how about Very Bad Things, which had big name actors like Christian Slater and Cameron Diaz (well, "big name" might be overdoing it) as well as, ironically, Daniel Stern.

The best example I know is The Score. My friends and I went to see it, as it starred Robert DeNiro, Edward Norton, and Marlon Brando, all of whom are terrific actors. The result was one of the most boring and pointless movies I've ever had the displeasure to see, and which will doubtlessly be forgotten by all in a few years. Doesn't all this make you think? All this time and money and effort, thousands of movies, and yet so few that anyone has actually bothered to see?

John Owen Skinner