ON SCREEN: Joe's Apartment
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eye WEEKLY August 1, 1996
Toronto's arts newspaper .....free every Thursday
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ON SCREEN ON SCREEN
JOE'S APARTMENT
Starring Jerry O'Connell and Megan Ward. Written and directed by John
Payson. (PG)
(eee of 5 eyes)
by
Alex Patterson
The cockroach is the most despised insect on earth, a creature even
Albert Schweitzer couldn't resist squashing. Folks who'll line up to
watch a psycho-killer on a head-pulling rampage still cringe at the
sight of these minute monsters. (I think it's the antennae that do
it.) So be warned: in Joe's Apartment, the hero shares his place with
approximately 20,000 of the revolting little brown guys.
If the prospect of bugs in cornflakes upsets you, stop reading now. On
the other hand, if you like the idea of foul-mouthed, wise-cracking
roaches (All-singing! All-dancing! All-swearing!) choreographed into
Busby Berkeley routines -- not to mention more toilet humor (horse
manure, urinal cakes) than a Jim Carrey triple-feature -- you're in
for an infestation of laughs.
In the opening frames, Joe (Jerry O'Connell, one of the Stand By Me
kids) arrives in New York from Iowa, and nabs a filthy flat in the
punks-and-panhandlers East Village. He also finds his dream girl
(Megan Ward), a pretty idealist intent on transforming an Avenue B
bombsite into a community garden. But everything's a no-go until Joe's
live-in vermin -- as intractable as the Teamsters and almost as ugly -
- grant their permission. In this film, cucarachas aren't waiting for
a nuclear holocaust, they already rule the planet.
With its spectacular digital trickery, its mondo-disgusto sensibility
and its weird cameos (crooner Don Ho, Man From U.N.C.L.E.'s Robert
Vaughn), writer-director John Payson's popular MTV short makes its
transition to the big screen surprisingly successfully. I would have
rated it more than three eyeballs had I not noticed that most of the
audience wasn't enjoying it as much as I was. Despite being funnier
and scarier than The Frighteners, I suspect Joe's Apartment is a movie
many people would rather smack with a shoe.
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