I
am sure that actor Jerry O'Connell enjoyed his trip to Australia and
kissing Estella Warren more than most adults will enjoy KANGAROO JACK
($28). With its penchant for bathroom humor and occasionally annoying
characters, KANGAROO JACK is a "family movie" that will
most likely only appeal to tweens and teens. While I’ll usually laugh at
most anything remotely funny, this movie had me chuckling only a handful
of times (and groaning impatiently the rest of the time). About the only
thing in KANGAROO JACK that held my interest were the scenes with
the beautiful Estella Warren, but then again, I’d enjoy watching her
read the phonebook.
The
plot of KANGAROO JACK revolves around Brooklyn hairdresser Charlie
Carbone (Jerry O'Connell), who runs afoul of his mob boss stepfather Sal
(Christopher Walken), while helping out his irresponsible best friend
Louis Booker (Anthony Anderson) in one of his usual harebrained schemes.
To make up for their misdeeds, Sal sends Charlie and Louis to the
Australian outback to deliver an envelope, which they are not to open
under any circumstance. As expected, Louis opens the envelope, while in
traveling to the land down under, and discovers it contains $50,000.00 in
cash. Then while driving through the outback to their appointed
rendezvous, Charlie and Louis have a run in with a kangaroo, that ends up
wearing Louis’ lucky jacket, and hopping away with the $50,000.00 in the
pocket.
The
rest of the movie follows our intrepid heroes’ quest to catch the
kangaroo and get the money back, while avoiding the bad guy that they were
to deliver the money in the first place. Into this mess comes a lovely
American girl named Jessie (Estella Warren), who saves Charlie and Louis
from dying of thirst out in the middle of nowhere. With an offer of money
to help Jessie with her wildlife cause, our two boys from Brooklyn have
suddenly seem to have and actual chance of catching the $50,000.00
kangaroo. One last note about KANGAROO JACK-- those of you
expecting to see a movie with the talking and rapping Kangaroo of
television commercials and movie trailers are going to be a bit
disappointed- as this CGI creation appears only briefly, when one of our
water-deprived heroes begins hallucinating.
Warner
Home Video has made KANGAROO JACK available on DVD in a 2.35:1 wide
screen presentation that has been enhanced for playback on 16:9 displays.
While the movie is no great shakes, KANGAROO JACK the DVD is pretty
marvelous looking. The image is crisp and well defined, with the film’s
attractive cinematography looking like a travelogue of the Australian
outback. Colors appear rich and vibrant, while the flesh tones are always
appealing. Neither chroma noise nor smearing are present to mar the fine
color reproduction. Blacks are right on the money, whites are stable and
the image produces excellent shadow detail and depth. Digital compression
artifacts are always well concealed on the eighty-nine minute movie.
KANGAROO
JACK comes with a terrific sounding Dolby Digital 5.1 channel
soundtrack. The action elements of the sound design take it out of the
realm of a standard comedy mix, which allows for some aggressively
deployed sound effects that make good use of all the discrete channels.
The comedy elements provide for a lot of unnecessarily loud shrieking, as
well as some nicely integrated bits of popular music. Speaking of the
music, it is always reproduced with excellent fidelity. The bass channel
delivers a rock ‘em sock ‘em punch for the film’s sound effects and
occasionally the musical portion of the mix. Dialogue is always completely
intelligible, although there were moments that I wished it wasn’t.
French and Spanish 5.1 tracks are also encoded onto the DVD, as are
English, French and Spanish subtitles.
Full
motion video, animation and sound serve to enhance the DVD’s interactive
menus. Through the menus, one has access to the standard scene selection
and set up features, as well as the DVD’s supplements. Director David
McNally, actors Jerry O'Connell, Estella Warren and Anthony Anderson, plus
visual effects supervisor Hoyt Yeatman are on hand for the first of the
DVD’s two audio commentary tracks. A scene specific commentary with
Kangaroo Jack himself (or at least the actor that voiced him in the movie)
is also provided. There are times that the commentaries are a bit more
entertaining than the movie itself, with the comments on the film’s CGI
visual effects being fairly interesting. Many of the other supplements
seem geared towards the kids, especially the Auditions, Behind
The Gas and Jackie Leg's Dance Grooves segments. A
theatrical trailer, outtakes and cast & crew filmographies close out
the supplements.
KANGAROO
JACK is a "family movie" that I doubt too many adults will
have the patience to sit through. However, if you are like me and would
enjoy watching Estella Warren read the phonebook, you may get some small
pleasure out of KANGAROO JACK. As for the DVD, it looks and sounds
great, so you can’t go wrong in that department.
I
am sure that actor Jerry O'Connell enjoyed his trip to Australia and
kissing Estella Warren more than most adults will enjoy KANGAROO JACK
($28). With its penchant for bathroom humor and occasionally annoying
characters, KANGAROO JACK is a "family movie" that will
most likely only appeal to tweens and teens. While I’ll usually laugh at
most anything remotely funny, this movie had me chuckling only a handful
of times (and groaning impatiently the rest of the time). About the only
thing in KANGAROO JACK that held my interest were the scenes with
the beautiful Estella Warren, but then again, I’d enjoy watching her
read the phonebook.
The
plot of KANGAROO JACK revolves around Brooklyn hairdresser Charlie
Carbone (Jerry O'Connell), who runs afoul of his mob boss stepfather Sal
(Christopher Walken), while helping out his irresponsible best friend
Louis Booker (Anthony Anderson) in one of his usual harebrained schemes.
To make up for their misdeeds, Sal sends Charlie and Louis to the
Australian outback to deliver an envelope, which they are not to open
under any circumstance. As expected, Louis opens the envelope, while in
traveling to the land down under, and discovers it contains $50,000.00 in
cash. Then while driving through the outback to their appointed
rendezvous, Charlie and Louis have a run in with a kangaroo, that ends up
wearing Louis’ lucky jacket, and hopping away with the $50,000.00 in the
pocket.
The
rest of the movie follows our intrepid heroes’ quest to catch the
kangaroo and get the money back, while avoiding the bad guy that they were
to deliver the money in the first place. Into this mess comes a lovely
American girl named Jessie (Estella Warren), who saves Charlie and Louis
from dying of thirst out in the middle of nowhere. With an offer of money
to help Jessie with her wildlife cause, our two boys from Brooklyn have
suddenly seem to have and actual chance of catching the $50,000.00
kangaroo. One last note about KANGAROO JACK-- those of you
expecting to see a movie with the talking and rapping Kangaroo of
television commercials and movie trailers are going to be a bit
disappointed- as this CGI creation appears only briefly, when one of our
water-deprived heroes begins hallucinating.
Warner
Home Video has made KANGAROO JACK available on DVD in a 2.35:1 wide
screen presentation that has been enhanced for playback on 16:9 displays.
While the movie is no great shakes, KANGAROO JACK the DVD is pretty
marvelous looking. The image is crisp and well defined, with the film’s
attractive cinematography looking like a travelogue of the Australian
outback. Colors appear rich and vibrant, while the flesh tones are always
appealing. Neither chroma noise nor smearing are present to mar the fine
color reproduction. Blacks are right on the money, whites are stable and
the image produces excellent shadow detail and depth. Digital compression
artifacts are always well concealed on the eighty-nine minute movie.
KANGAROO
JACK comes with a terrific sounding Dolby Digital 5.1 channel
soundtrack. The action elements of the sound design take it out of the
realm of a standard comedy mix, which allows for some aggressively
deployed sound effects that make good use of all the discrete channels.
The comedy elements provide for a lot of unnecessarily loud shrieking, as
well as some nicely integrated bits of popular music. Speaking of the
music, it is always reproduced with excellent fidelity. The bass channel
delivers a rock ‘em sock ‘em punch for the film’s sound effects and
occasionally the musical portion of the mix. Dialogue is always completely
intelligible, although there were moments that I wished it wasn’t.
French and Spanish 5.1 tracks are also encoded onto the DVD, as are
English, French and Spanish subtitles.
Full
motion video, animation and sound serve to enhance the DVD’s interactive
menus. Through the menus, one has access to the standard scene selection
and set up features, as well as the DVD’s supplements. Director David
McNally, actors Jerry O'Connell, Estella Warren and Anthony Anderson, plus
visual effects supervisor Hoyt Yeatman are on hand for the first of the
DVD’s two audio commentary tracks. A scene specific commentary with
Kangaroo Jack himself (or at least the actor that voiced him in the movie)
is also provided. There are times that the commentaries are a bit more
entertaining than the movie itself, with the comments on the film’s CGI
visual effects being fairly interesting. Many of the other supplements
seem geared towards the kids, especially the Auditions, Behind
The Gas and Jackie Leg's Dance Grooves segments. A
theatrical trailer, outtakes and cast & crew filmographies close out
the supplements.
KANGAROO
JACK is a "family movie" that I doubt too many adults will
have the patience to sit through. However, if you are like me and would
enjoy watching Estella Warren read the phonebook, you may get some small
pleasure out of KANGAROO JACK. As for the DVD, it looks and sounds
great, so you can’t go wrong in that department.
