Dear lord where to start. Pluto Nash is not only one of the worst movies I have seen in recent memory, it may very well be the worst movie I have ever had the misfortune to cast my gaze over. So horrible was this movie watching experience that I seriously considered not writing this review, lest it conjure up mental images of the true horror that is Pluto Nash.

The film was shelved for nearly two years before its terrible theatre run, a run which saw it chalk up one of the biggest losses in cinema history. A $4m box office take for a reported $90m budget is just mind bogglingly bad. Clearly no-one was fooled by the awful trailer which pitches the film as a comedy (which it is certainly not) and also manages to give away the films twist (which even if you haven’t seen the trailer is so obvious it should be sign posted).

The evidence for the prosecution milord…..

Eddie, Eddie, Eddie, what happened? The man had the golden touch in the 80’s, any film he touched was box office gold. His infectious laugh and rapid delivery was a comedy money train that saw a string of entertaining and downright funny films. Then we get into the 90’s and everything goes pear shaped. Eddie slips unnoticed into ‘kiddie’ mode making nonsense for the family like The Nutty Professor and utter, detestable tripe like Dr. Dolittle.

With Pluto Nash it seems like Eddie is trying to get his adult edge back. The film is sporadically violent and contains a smattering of (pretty mild) curse words. All that this achieves however is to make the film feel unbalanced and unsure of itself. Is this a family film or a sci-fi/comedy/action film? We don’t know and the film certainly never clearly defines itself.

Aside from Murphy’s attempts to get back a little of his roots, his standard of acting here is deplorable. The jokes, which should be rolling from the tongue of such a talented comedy actor, feel incredibly forced. Even if we lay the blame of this at the writer’s feet, there is no excusing the constant mugging that Murphy passes of as acting.

Aside from Murphy you have a truly dreadful performance from Randy Quaid as a robot. Apparently playing a robot is no tougher than having a metal plate on the back of your bald head, talking funny and moving very stiffly. Quaid is supposed to be the comedy foil to Murphy’s lead, which gives you an indication of how bad this film stinks.

The rest of the cast is made up of incredibly capable actors that are wasted on this dreadful material. It actually hurt me to see the likes of Joey Pants, Luis ‘the’ Guzman, Peter Boyle, Alec Baldwin, John Cleese and Pam Grier slumming themselves in this dreck. I guess rent suddenly went up in California…… Rosaria Dawson is a new face to me, but again she is wasted. Nice to look at, but obviously being held back by the nonsense masquerading as a script.

Director Ron Underwood has created a woefully inept look at the future. Ripping off every single sci-fi film you care to mention, this vision of the future appears to have been filmed entirely on a sound stage. At no point do we feel like we are watching anything other than a bunch of actors hamming it up next to some polystyrene rocks and some grey dust. I could almost see the catering truck just off to the left of shot. He also can’t direct action scenes for squat. They are flat and lifeless with not an ounce of excitement.

For a film that cost $90m you have to wonder where the money went (Eddie Murphy’s back pocket perhaps?). It certainly wasn’t spent on the effects which are just awful. Crappy CGI flying cars and dodgy looking cityscapes litter the film. The props look like, well props. Guns have garish primary coloured attachments; I guess that makes them ‘futuristic’.

Did I mention the incredibly overbearing soundtrack that pipes up loudly and into full dramatic mode when someone does something as mundane as say sitting down?

The case for the defence milord…..

Nothing, this film has no redeeming qualities whatsoever.