Mouse
Hunt
Specs:
1 Hr. 33 Mins.
Color
Theatrical Aspect Ratio 1.85:1
Subtitles: English, Spanish, French
Audio Tracks: English (Dolby Digital 5.1),
French (Dolby Digital
5.1),
Spanish (Dolby Digital 2.0 Surround),
Deleted sceness
Stunt footage
It seems that only recently director Gore Verbinski has really made a name for himself. Sadly, despite his recent recognition status, nobody seems to realize he has actually been making movies for a while. One of his earliest ones is an underrated 90's dark comedy named Mouse hunt. Sadly, when it first came out hardly anybody went to see it, and it barely made a dent at the box-office. This is too bad, but it is also understandable after seeing the film. While it was marketed towards kids this is a surprising dark and exceedingly odd movie that has cult status written all over it. Thankfully, it really deserves it.
The story is fairly basic, which works for the movie. The film follows two brothers Lars (Lee Evans) and Ernie (Nathan Lane) who inherit both a house and a string factory from their dead father. Ernie used to be a rising star in the restaurant world until a culinary disaster closed his restaurant and forced him on the streets. At the same time, his brother Lars is trying to fend off a large conglomerate corporation from buying the factory. He, of course, refuses which makes his wife to leave him and kick him out of the house. Now, both homeless, the only place they have to live is the decrepit house they inherited from their father.
Things look bright when they get there as they learn that it is actually built by a famous architect and is worth a lot of money. Before they do that they have to do two things. First, they have to somehow pay off the mortgage. Second, they have to restore the house for the auction. The only problem standing in their way is a little mouse that is extremely smart and proceeds to wreak havoc in the house and their world.
It's hard to pinpoint the exact inspiration of this film as the movie seems to be a whole grab-bag of different styles and influences. The most obvious one is the Vaudeville or Laurel and Hardy style comedy in which the two brothers go to excessive lengths to kill the mouse. Over half the film is actually set-pieces of different ways they try out to destroy the mouse, which get more destructive and more bizarre as they get progressively get more desperate. Many critics complained of this one-note premise and in all fairness it is a one-note premise. Yet, it is done so well. A lot of the things they think up and the ways in which the mouse stops them are both ingenious and extremely funny. Also, the director and screenwriter know how to build these set-pieces. For example, had they started off with large and extravagant tricks beforehand then the jokes would have been lost.
One also has to give credit to the production design too. While the comedy maybe Vaudeville the architecture and look is somewhat Gothic, making everything like the house a beauty to look at. Admittedly, most of the color scheme stays in the brown area, but it works for the kind of film this is. Both the design of the factory and house really stand out.
This film also has a lot of guts to become as dark as it is. It's very odd that this was marketed as a children's film as this doesn't really seem like a children's film. While it comes to a happy ending, the mouse through most of the film resembles something demonic, physically assaulting an exterminator and making the brothers life a living Hell. Also, we get a subtle clue that the mouse killed the previous owner. As whacky as the brother's hijinks are this is a surprisingly eccentric and dark film.
Finally, a lot of credit has to go to the two actors Lee Evans and Nathan Lane. Not only do they have great chemistry together, but they know exactly what kind of humor they are dealing with and how to play it. Much like the pacing of the film it is a joy to see them gradually get more and more deranged as the mouse becomes an ever increasing menace. Lee Evans was the real surprise doing some great physical comedy. Of course, Nathan Lane was great too but that was expected.
Of course, it's not a perfect film as the emotional subtext dealing with their brotherly quarrels didn't completely connect. Frankly, this film works best as a dark comedy. Still, this is a shamefully underrated film by a great director. If you want to see what else Verbinski can do see this today.
Extras
There are very little extras on this disk. They're are some deleted scenes. They are not very good so it's easy to see why they were taken out. The most interesting extra is the teaser and theatrical trailer. Watching them it seems as the studio had no idea how to market this film so they did something random. Both trailers are truly awful. Maybe that's why nobody went to see it.
Rating:
***1/2 out of ****
Review by Blake Hinton
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