The Decline of Eddie Murphy

Before I get into anything else, I want to thank everyone who wrote comments on the last couple of posts. Thanks to Kaleen, Daniel G., MC, Kim, Whitney, Laura, Shaun, Fox, Megan, Rick Ryan, Evan Derrick, Fletch, DC Movie Girl, and Ross Williams for your great comments!

Also, thanks to everyone who voted in this week's poll question. Apparently, the majority of film fans haven't enjoyed a Cuba Gooding Jr. movie in over 10 YEARS. As Good as it Gets topped out as the winner. I would recommend Men of Honor, the story of the first African-American US Navy Diver, as worthy of a Netflix rental.

On to this week's events!
Last week, Ross Williams raised a good question.

What the hell has happened to Eddie Murphy?

Saturday Night Live. 48 Hrs. Trading Places. Coming to America! Anyone can name a bunch of Eddie Murphy classics. You own them. You quote them. You love them. The thing is, Murphy came to America a long, long time ago.

In the 1980s, he was a comedy God.
In the 90s, atheism took over.
No one believes in Eddie Murphy anymore.

How does someone start so high and then fall so low? Since my last post, I've been trying to figure this out. These days, the image of Murphy is one of fat suits and failure. Nowadays, anyone can name any bunch Eddie Murphy flops. Some might say his post-80s career peaked at The Nutty Professor and then something happened. Movie after movie got released. Each one seemed worse than the last.

What happened to the raunchy comic who crossed over successfully onto the big-screen? How did the star of so many comedy classics end up making a series of disappointing B-pictures? Was there something that happened in his career or in his life that forced this change? One of the things people don't talk about is that...

Eddie Murphy has been making awful movies
since the beginning of his career.

Contrary to popular belief, Murphy made bad movies long before the mid-90s.

1. Best Defense (1984)
2. The Golden Child (1986)

Told you so.

Luckily for Murphy, these bad movies were released in between good ones. Trading Places, Beverly Hills Cop, and Beverly Hills Cop II. They made you forget the bad ones. The good movies outshone the bad ones. Not anymore.

Today, the opposite is happening. Murphy's been in a number of good movies since The Nutty Professor. Don't believe me? What about Life, Dreamgirls, and three Shrek movies? And who could forget about "The PJs?" Don't tell me I'm alone in my love for "The PJs?" The trouble is, all of those good movies are sandwiched between multiple terrible ones. Today, the bad movies are outweighing the good.

Kid-Tested, Mother Approved

Murphy's stand-up comedy was raunchy and people loved it. Most of his early 80s movies had a lot of swearing, potty humor, fight scenes, even nudity. Who can forget the Coming to America bath scene? Everything was working out just fine. Then came a couple flops.

Beverly Hills Cop III, Vampire in Brooklyn, and Metro showed that a change was in order.

Enter: the Family-Friendly Films.

These movies were huge! These were his tickets back to the top.
That's when the trouble began.

Two of Murphy's biggest successes were in voice-over work. The only times critics saw him on-screen were in family movies like Dr. Dolittle. Family movies hardly ever get a fair shake from the critical community. Once the memories of The Nutty Professor faded away, Hollywood seemed to forget why we liked Eddie Murphy. Or that we liked him at all.

Raunchy 80s Eddie worked. Squeaky clean Eddie worked too. When he tries to land somewhere in the middle, that's when everything goes wrong. It hasn't worked since The Nutty Professor. Since then, Holy Man, Bowfinger, Showtime, The Adventures of Pluto Nash, and I Spy represent a long series of PG-13 disasters.

You would think that after the first few flops, he would have realized what worked and what didn't. But no, something kept pushing Eddie to abandon the successful formulas. Just look at that list of stinkers! For a while, it seemed like nothing could resurrect his career.

Like my girlfriend's favorite singer says,
"the times, they are a-changin'."

Financial hits like Daddy Day Care kept Eddie afloat as did the Shrek 2 monster. Then Eddie was cast as James "Thunder" Early in the critically-adored Dreamgirls. Who would have thought that Pluto Nash would ever get an Oscar nomination?

But as my girlfriend's favorite boyfriend predicted, he didn't win. The Oscar went to Alan Arkin for Little Miss Sunshine and Pluto Nash stormed out of the Kodak Theatre and got back on his spaceship. Who needs dignity when you're getting ready to knock the movie-going public on their butts?

After things started getting good for Eddie Murphy...someone whispered into his ear. That person (Satan, I believe), told him that CROSSDRESSING and FAT SUITS were the logical next step to follow an Oscar nomination.

[That tagline couldn't be more fitting.]

His role in Dreamgirls will probably go down in history as little more than a fluke. There were persistent rumors that the Oscar went to Alan Arkin instead of Murphy because his next film was Norbit. The Academy refused to reward someone who starred, co-starred, and wrote this piece of garbage. Well, serves him right. He should have known better.

What works for Eddie Murphy are PG-rated Kids Movies. Possibly, someday, he could return to his R-rated raunchy roots and give that a try again. But what he needs to stop doing is making PG-13 bombs. His latest, Meet Dave is a prime example of what Hollywood needs to stop. They always bomb, so why keep making them?

What's Next for Norbit?

Excluding Meet Dave, his next few movies don't appear to be Norbit-bad. Still in the development stages, Murphy has two projects that each sound interesting. The first, A Thousand Words follows a guy finds out he only has 1,000 words left to speak before he dies. How the script will deal with the fact that he could just opt not to speak is left to be seen.

The second film is called NowhereLand. Murphy is a busy dad, too busy for his own daughter. Somehow, he ends up in his daughter's imaginary world. I bet there'll be a lot of lessons learned in this one. Hopefully, each of these will be successful and he'll finally learn to let someone else entertain the 13+ crowds. The world can't handle another Bowfinger.

The Decline of Cuba Gooding Jr.

Quick! Name three great Cuba Gooding Jr. movies. Were any of them made before 2001? I didn't think so.

Cuba's career has steadily taken a nosedive for as long as most young filmgoers can remember. If I were a few years younger, my opinions of Cuba would most likely be different. Luckily, I can remember the good days.

Growing up, I could head to the theater and watch As Good as it Gets and What Dreams May Come to see this actor perform his ass off. Nowadays, all the kids get are Snow Dogs and Norbit.

What happened? How does an Oscar-winning actor who clearly had the chops find his way into any non-animated, post-Nutty Professor Eddie Murphy movie? Hell, his first major role was in Boyz n the Hood! If you've yet to partake in the sweet, cinematic nectar that is Boyz n the Hood, do yourself this favor.

Something must have happened. Something changed things for Cuba. Today, I tracked that something down.

Two tragedies took place in America in 2001. One of them was 9/11, the other was Pearl Harbor.

The only bombs Michael Bay should be concerned with are his own. When the film was released, it became clear that turning an attack on American soil into a love story was a bad idea. At least that's the message Oliver Stone took from the movie.

Cuba played Petty Officer Doris Miller, a boxer/cook who is quick to grab a machine gun when the Pearl Harbor hits the fan. Nobody loved this movie. Sadly, Cuba was attached to this stinkbomb and now he's paying the price.

After the Oscar win, his films continued to impress anyone willing to watch. The critics loved him in As Good as it Gets. They didn't hate him in Men of Honor either. He was getting better and better. But it's just like that old kamikaze pilot saying, what goes up must come down.

Pearl Harbor was the turning point. Cuba's co-stars (i.e. Affleck and Harnett), have found their own ways to stay out of the limelight (Gigli and Hollywood Homicide, respectively) but after this movie there was no looking back for Mr. Show Me the Money.



The following year marked the beginning of the Snow Dogs era. Scripts about talking animals remakes of It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World, started getting passed across Cuba's desk and Cuba read them all. Here's the tricky part. Why did he read these scripts, and more importantly, why did he take these roles?

Here's a clip from Boat Trip. No need for a plot description for this one. The clip explains it all. Tell me this. What about this earth-shaking dialogue made anyone involved think that this movie won't suck?

Here's the thing. These movies are not stopping. In seven years, Cuba Gooding Jr. has been in over fifteen terrible movies. Fifteen! And they keep getting worse! At least the first few of his movies made it to theaters. Now, there's a steady stream of straight-to-DVD releases with his pretty face plastered all over them.

You have to imagine that the paychecks he's being offered aren't that high anymore. How much money can someone make by recording a voice for a character named Loofah in The Land Before Time XIII: The Wisdom of Friends? No, I'm not kidding. Loofah!

Cuba recently played a flamboyant drug dealer in Ridley Scott's American Gangster. In a surprising turn of events, his performance was the most enjoyable part of that film. Could this have been a sign? Was a "Cuba Comeback" in order?



Sadly, American Gangster was not the catapult Cuba needed to get back on the right track. Nothing could prove that more than a quick look at his upcoming projects. Another straight-to-DVD feature with Ray Liotta, a drug gang movie that probably won't see theatres, and a military horror film with monsters that look like this.

Oh wait, one more. As you all know, he's also in this movie:

Cuba once complained that all the good roles go to Will Smith.
Looks like Smith missed one.

With his next two years tied up in terrible looking movies, it would seem that the "Cuba Comeback" is going to have to wait. Isn't there some way to bring back pre-Pearl Harbor Cuba? I miss Major Salt, Cpl. Carl Hammaker, and Chief Carl Brashear. I miss Tré Styles', Rod Tidwell, and Frank Sachs. What I don't miss is Loofah the talking dinosaur.

Attention all Hollywood bigwigs! Please start greenlighting scripts with at least TWO roles for black actors so that Cuba Gooding Jr. can co-star with Will Smith. That is, if Martin Lawrence doesn't get first pick.

Thanks for reading everyone. Also, I want to thank everyone who commented on my last post. I couldn't believe the response that funny looking poster received. Here are my favorite people in the world right now: Daniel G., The Mad Hatter, Whitney, Megan, Keith, Rick Olsen, Kaleen, MC, and Kim. I am loving the comments and feedback from everyone, keep them coming!