If you reduce the average screwball comedy to psychological reality, all the characters would be thrown in prison, the psych ward or 30-day rehab. Such an approach sort of defeats the purpose of making a movie like that.
Nevertheless, the remake of the 1981 classic “Arthur” manages to usher the tipsy millionaire hero into an Alcoholic Anonymous program. In the real world, this is good; in the movie, well, you’ve certainly got a different kind of picture.
Arthur, played in 1981 by Dudley Moore and in 2011 by another English comedian, Russell Brand, is heir to a billion-dollar fortune.
After frittering away his life in fun, he’s given an ultimatum: Marry an acceptable and responsible woman capable of managing his life or forfeit his inheritance.
In the new movie, Arthur meets a kooky tour guide named Naomi (Greta Gerwig, from “Greenberg”) just at the moment he agrees to marry the awful socialite Susan (Jennifer Garner). Of course Naomi represents his shot at true love, but a billion dollars …
In executing this adaptation, TV director Jason Winer somehow manages to always have the camera in the wrong place at the wrong time, even when that stringy-haired scarecrow Russell Brand (who performed so admirably as the debauched rock star in “Forgetting Sarah Marshall”) is offering a genuinely funny line reading or two.
Going for psychological motivation (Arthur misses his dead father) or substance-abuse counseling seems like an odd choice in a movie where the hero has a magnetized bed and full-scale replica of the Batmobile.
Nobody’s going to top Dudley Moore’s glorious performance from the original “Arthur,” but the odds are stacked against Brand, especially since, at this point in his career, he’s still more of a comedian than an actor.
John Gielgud won an Oscar for playing Arthur’s unflappable butler in the 1981 film; Helen Mirren won’t repeat the trick, although she’s well-qualified for the part.
Luis Guzman is left with too little to do as Arthur’s chauffeur, and Nick Nolte (where’s he been?) lends a weird intensity to his scenes as Susan’s father.
Tech note: I assume this film was shot in a digital format, and it was projected at a preview screening in a super-bright, crystal-clear digital process. If this is how things are going to be in the movie of the future, someone needs to re-think issues of lighting, makeup and the art of the close-up, because almost everybody in this film looks ghastly.
Please, show a little mercy to these actors and their magnified imperfections.
“Arthur”
Treating the 1981 classic with a sort of psychological reality is exactly the wrong approach for screwball comedy, and despite the best efforts of Brit comic Russell Brand, who plays the billionaire man-child about to be cut off from his inheritance, not much works in this remake. With Helen Mirren, Greta Gerwig.
Rated: PG-13 for language, subject matter.
Showing: Alderwood Mall, Cinebarre, Everett Stadium, Galaxy Monroe, Marysville, Stanwood, Metro, Pacific Place, Thornton Place, Woodinville, Cascade Mall.
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