Well folks... a long time ago MORIARTY took a gander at this film and liked it quite a bit, he had a couple of problems here and there.... and it looks like they are still there btw, but he enjoyed the film.. anyways. Personally, I've thought the posters and the trailer for the film haven't done all that much for me, but... hey.... that's life....

I am kind of excited, so pardon my review if it isn't too good. I have been visiting your web site for years now, and I think it is great.

As for why I am writing you. I am a student at The University of South Carolina, and I was lucky enough to catch a screening of Life yesterday. This was a movie I have been looking forward to for a while. I haven't been a huge Eddie Murphy fan lately, but when I heard he was teaming up with Martin Lawrence in an R-rated movie, I thought I would witness the rebirth of the "old" fast talking, foul mouthed and funny Eddie Murphy.

I did, but he isn't the same and I will explain later.

Well, I heard about the screening last week, and I was excited about getting tickets for the show. I didn't know when the tickets were going to be given out. I was lucky though, because I am a building manager at the Student Union here, I was first in line to get tickets, yesterday morning, because I was on duty. So I got a ticket for me and a friend. Later that night I ate at Taco Hell, which is only a 30 second walk from our theater. As for our theater, it seats 300 people and has a great sound system. I like that is fairly small, because when the theater is packed, which it was, it can be a great experience.

As for the previews, I saw one for American pie, and the place just went CRAZY, during the first part, where some guy is masturbating, and is caught by his mom. Also they went nuts during the last part, which has some guy getting caught again, but by his dad. He gets caught with a "PIE" on his privates, because he heard sex is as good as "PIE". The whole preview was hilarious, and I have high hopes for the film.

As for the film....

Again I had high hopes for the film, and after seeing it I was pleased. But before you see it, you must do one thing. Don't go into the move expecting anything believable. What I mean is the whole prison experience, it is all incredibly unbelievable. For example.... The main guard says anyone who crosses the "fence" will be shot, yet when Eddie and Martin escape and get caught, they get ONE day in the hole. Hmmm... sounds like real prison to me. So again, go to the movie, expecting comedy and a little( I mean little) bit of drama, and you should come back pleased.

As for the two main actors, I was expecting Martin to do his usual dirty jokes, and for Eddie to be tame(which he has been lately). I was treated to a surprise though. Eddie was the foul mouth, and Martin was tame. Overall, Eddie was really funny. I was happy to see him back to his old form. But I was a little saddened to see that when he went off into one of his rants (like from Trading Places, and Beverly Hills Cop) it seemed a little pushed. It seemed like it wasn't coming natural to him like in the old days. But again I was happy to see him having a potty mouth again, but not doing potty jokes like in the Nutty Proffesor and Dr. Dolittle. He really is at his funniest in R-rated films. As for Martin, he seemed to have picked this role, because of his recent events(like the freeway handgun incident....). In this movie, he was portraying a normal joe, that just got caught in the wrong place at the wrong time. It was a pretty straightforward part, but he played it well and was hilarious throughout the movie.

The supporting characters were outstanding. Even though they were stereotypical, they picked the perfect actors to portray them. Such as Bernie Mac(from Friday. The fat guy from the beer football commercial, with the guys getting yelled at by their coach in the training room, and Clarence Witherspoon (from the original Mod Squad). The only thing I was dissapointed with was the stereotypical gay guy. Even though he was extremely funny, it just seemed like they put him in there, because the producers think that all prisons movies must have a homosexual theme to it. The supporting actors as a whole, had more laugh out loud scenes than did Eddie and Martin as a whole. Bernie Mac stole quite a few scenes.

The music for the film was great. The rap songs were good, and I was extremely surprised and happy at how good the score by Wyclef Jean was.

The 2 big events at the end were very predictable, but surprisingly, they were pleasing. One incident seemed to be put in there, because it would have obviously upset a lot of people (not me) had there unjustified (big surprise!!!!) jailing not been resolved.

Again the believability of the film was absolutely zero. But it was really funny, and the whole crowd seemed to enjoy it. This movie should bring in about 50-75 million, and hopefully Eddie will start doing more roles like this.

P.S. This is my first review.... so I hope I did OK.

Thanks....

Andrew L. Webber