Be Cool Movie Review: By Adam Mast, ZBoneMan.com

Be Cool is certainly less cool than the previous installment - the ultra hip Get Shorty. While both films are based on novels by the terrific Elmore Leonard, this picture lacks the cohesion and satirical edge of director Barry Sonnenfeld’s original. Be Cool opts to trade in Get Shorty’s wit for a lot of obvious inside jokes and esoteric humor.

In this comedy, John Travolta’s Chili Palmer (an ex-mob man) becomes so disenchanted with the movie business, that he decides to ditch it in favor of the music industry. Right away it becomes painfully clear that there isn’t much difference - just different faces of the same general monster. After witnessing his friend (a record executive played by James Woods) come to a bad end, he quickly bonds with the man’s wife (played by Uma Thurman) and persuades her to sign an up-and-coming singer (played by up and comer Christina Milian) to a recording contract. Naturally, the music biz proves to be every bit as turbulent as the movie biz, and soon, Palmer finds himself battling rival record execs, a gang of Russian thugs, and a white pimp (hilariously played by Vince Vaughan) who’d put B-Rad of Malibu’s Most Wanted to shame.

What can you say about Mr. Travolta? He’s was born to play this character - he’s just...cool. He slips into Chili Palmer’s shoes effortlessly and maintains a consistent level of smoothness and swagger. It’s hard to not laugh at Vaughn’s dimwitted pimp Raji, even if he’s completely over the top. He never really brings that sort of realistic vibe that made Gary Oldman’s Drexl Spivey in True Romance so memorable, but this is much lighter fare, and that girlish giggle of his (the same one he used as Wes Mantooth in Anchorman) just slays me. Uma Thurman is downright sexy as the lushy but sincere Edie Athens, and she looks to be having a great time with Travolta again. Sadly the grand redux dance sequence (the big Pulp Fiction wink) is incredibly labored and ultimately falls flat.

Christina Milian is beautiful and likable with amazing singing chops to boot. It would have been fun to see more of Robert Pastorelli’s heavy, Joe Loop. He brings a devilish sense of glee to the role of an intimidating hitman. The rest of the cast float in and out of the picture with only brief moments to shine. The Rock enjoys himself as a gay bodyguard with aspirations of becoming a big time actor, while Outkast’s Andre Benjamin shows up as a trigger-happy hip hopster.

There’s a certain sweetness to Be Cool. Chili might have been a murderous thug at one point in his life, but for the most part now, he’s evolved into an old softy, and he and Edie’s intentions are surprisingly noble. I fully expected Edie to turn into some kind of fiendish femme fatale and was pleasantly surprised to find that her heart remained 24 carat.

Be Cool was directed by F. Gary Gray (Friday, The Negotiator, and The Itallian Job), and for the first half of the picture, I really thought he’d done a good job with pacing and punching up the hip factor. But about the time the film hits the back stretch, Be Cool starts to show beads of sweat. The movie becomes tedious and lost in it’s cavalcade of cameos (i.e. Aerosmith’s Steven Tyler) and the plethora of characters we’d come to meet didn’t really figure into the plot in any kind of meaningful way. What’s more, most of the so-called insight into the record business isn’t insightful at all. It’s jabs at the industry aren’t nearly as clever or as entertaining as the pot shots taken at Hollywood in Get Shorty

Be Cool had a lot of potential but it never lives up to it. Travolta is terrific but he alone can’t save the picture, which ultimately squanders several grand opportunities. The entire cast look to be having a great time, but that doesn’t necessarily make it a great time for the audience. In the end, Be Cool be pretty mediocre.

Grade: C+

Adam Mast, ZBoneMan.com