Coming 2 America

[canyonwalker]

A week ago Hawk and I watched the movie Coming 2 America on Amazon Prime Video. TLDR: it was awful.

The film was so bad I paused it twice In the first 10 minutes to tell Hawk I was ready to leave the room. She was ready to quit, too. We had three major objections, all in just the first 10 minutes:

1. The movie portrayed African cultures with every corny, 1980s vintage US stereotype about how they're silly and obsessed with dancing, sex, and violence. If this movie were not produced by, directed by, and starring Black people it would be roundly condemned as racist.
2. The plot was premised on the existence of a law that treats women unequally— which nobody, including the reigning monarch of the land, thought could be changed. (What would it take to change it? Uh... the reigning monarch of the land simply saying so.)
3. The plot was also premised on rape. A rape that the film telegraphed would be played for laughs. (Also, the victim of the rape would be criticized for it, and the perpetrator(s) of the rape would be excused.)

We decided several times to continue watching the move despite our grave concerns. "Maybe it gets better," we told ourselves several times. And it did get better... though just barely. A few of the guest appearances from music stars were good. They raised the movie overall from an F to a D-.

One thing that really has me shaking my head about this movie is Eddie Murphy's involvement in it. After he became the hottest comedian and one of the hottest stars in Hollywood in the late 1980s he largely stepped away from both movies and comedy. He said he didn't like how Black people were portrayed. Now he comes out of decades-long early retirement... to shit this massive turd on us.

You needed the money, didn't you, Eddie? You needed the money badly enough to repudiate every principled thing you ever said. You're just the kind of money-grubbing Hollywood liar you spent 30 years asking people to stop giving money to.

Comments

[culfinriel]

I thought this was a bad idea, then I thought ok, maybe. Then every person I know who has seen it reviewed it. I really liked the first one, too.

[merhawk]

The second part slightly redeems it. If nothing else, fast forward to the scene with the music stars. That was pretty good.

[canyonwalker]

The new movie features a number of scenes from the original as flashbacks. That reminded me 1) how much the original was absolutely a classic, and 2) what a derivative turd the new movie is.