Men in Black

Bomb Rating: 

It almost looks as if an actual Will Smith was present during the shooting, rather than a celluloid cutout made possible by the same technology that transported Humphrey Bogart into a soft drink commercial.

Given this movie's abundance of special effects wizardry involving various kinds of aliens, it's easy to overlook the most impressive special effect of all: It involved taking Will Smith's performance from "Independence Day" and inserting it via computer right into "Men in Black." It almost looks as if an actual Will Smith was present during the shooting, rather than a celluloid cutout made possible by the same technology that transported Humphrey Bogart into a soft drink commercial and got Fred Astaire dancing with a vacuum cleaner.

"Men in Black" is an action-comedy in which Agent K (Tommy Lee Jones) recruits a new agent, J (Will Smith), and together they battle to save the Earth against aliens, particularly one Edgar (Vincent D'Onofrio) who is plotting to take over the galaxy. We soon learn that aliens have been living among us for quite some time, though only a few are threats to the public order.

Part of the plot of "Men in Black" rests on the idea that tabloid newspapers provide actual evidence that helps the government track down and capture troublesome aliens. Despite the inference of comedy, this raises the question of whether "Men in Black" was bankrolled by the National Enquirer or some other such outfit. The implication that tabloids and trash television may contain even a seed of truth is a possibility too dangerous to even fathom. Do we not already have enough lunatics running around claiming to have been beamed up by the mothership? "Men in Black" may be mere amusement for many Americans, but for our nation's moron majority, it could prove dangerously validating.

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