NATIONAL LAMPOON'S LOADED WEAPON 1 (1993)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *poor*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *comedy*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *psychological, sociological*

In my review of the three NAKED GUN movies I noted that all of the "extra diegetic" nonsense-elements had to be disregarded when judging the phenomenality of the films. Once one excludes all the outright nonsense, the question becomes: do the diegetic elements fall into one category more than the others?

The closest thing to a coherent plot in this broad spoof of the LETHAL WEAPON films is the idea that evil mastermind General Mortars (William Shatner) is plotting to flood the country with Girl Scout cookies laced with cocaine. I consider this a "bizarre crime" along the same lines as non-comical films about villains unleashing Black Plague germs on an unwitting populace. So though Mortars' plan is given an absurd tone, its content aligns with the uncanny.

Emilio Estevez and Samuel L. Jackson play inspectors Colt and Luger, modeled loosely on the characters from the WEAPON films, though Luger seems to suffer from some of the PTSD of the Mel Gibson figure. (Something to do with a crossing guard incident.) Strangely, the one element of the WEAPON films that LOADED doesn't copy is that of adverse feelings. Here the two buddy-cops hardly ever utter a cross word to one another, much less being "mismatched." Maybe director/co-writer Gene Quintano was too busy trying to figure how many celebrity cameos he could shoehorn into the story (close to twenty by Wikipedia's count). Not that one expects deep characterization in a silly farce. But sometimes the irreverent imitation of high seriousness can yield good jokes.

Are there any good jokes in this farrago? A few, but in most respects it seems like a predecessor to the lazy spoof movies of the 21st century, with the main exception being that LOADED made fair money in 1993-- though not enough to garner a real sequel. Kathy Ireland plays a henchwoman for General Mortars who's patterned after the Sharon Stone character in BASIC INSTINCT, but the script fails to do anything with the idea and defaults to the "good girl" schtick. Tim Curry probably comes off best emulating the "Mister Joshua" character from the first WEAPON film, though F. Murray Abraham does nicely with his spoof of Hannibal Lecter. The pseudo-Lecter, being a cannibal like the original, is the only reason LOADED includes the trope "perilous psychos."