Made

Jon Favreau and Vince Vaughn are back together. Swingers, their first film, was a surprise hit. In Made, they recapture some of their magic, but what may be another hip, witty movie turns rambling and nearly annoying. This time around, they are small time criminals, on an assignment they know nothing about. Favreau (Love and Sex, The Replacements), who also wrote and directed the film, borrows many of the things that made Swingers so popular. He is Bobby, the exasperated man trying to survive in the world. His friend Rudy (Vaughn, The Cell, South of Heaven, Southwest of Hell) is the dimwitted motormouth, who always says the wrong thing at the wrong time. The only reason they are friends is because they grew up together. They could just as easily beat each other up (as they often do).

Rudy and Bobby lose their construction jobs, and the only thing left is to become 'made' by Max (Peter Falk, Lakeboat, 3 Days of Rain), Rudy's boss. Rudy agrees because he wants enough money to allow his girlfriend Jessica (Famke Janssen, X-Men, Love and Sex) to quit stripping. Max gives them instructions, and they are off to New York, with a list of what they can and cannot do, but no clue as to why they are actually there. In New York, they meet Ruiz (Sean "Puffy" Combs, The Fighting Temptations), who instructs them they are there to help him. It is basically a comedy of errors, and much of the story is pointless.

As a director, Favreau needs to work on his pacing. Made is not as amusing as it could be, mainly because of bad pacing. The movie feels as if it has no plot, and merely wanders from one wacky scene to the next. The humor suffers because of the lack of cohesion. Things are intermittently funny, with nothing holding them together. It also spotlights how potentially annoying Vaughn's character is. Rudy mouths off at everything. He is lazy and inept, and feels the need to hear his voice constantly. If not for Vaughn's presence, Bobby's job would be infinitely easier. Because of Rudy, Bobby continually runs into problems, prolonging his job and escalating his problems. Many of the situations feel forced, to allow Rudy to mouth off and provide some comedy in an otherwise barren script.

Favreau fares better as a writer. He has the ability to script witty retorts back and forth between the characters of Bobby and Rudy. There are some comic gems in the script, and Vaughn delivers them confidently. It is just a matter of deciding when the rant goes too far and becomes tiresome. It's sometimes difficult imagining how Rudy could still be alive with some of the things that come out of his mouth. Favreau's job is to look annoyed and haggard, and he does okay. Nobody else in the script does much or has much to do. The only notable aspect is that Combs is not horrible. It may be a better idea to watch Swingers again that to watch Made.

Mongoose Rates It: Okay.
1 hour, 35 minutes, Rated R for pervasive language, some drug use and sexuality.

Back to Movies