You know those movies that look stupid, but the trailer is funny and you are sure the best lines you have already seen over and over again? Well, Kangaroo Jack is not one of those movies. In fact after seeing Louis (Anthony Anderson, Barbershop) whine “He stole the money . . . and he is not giving it back.,” at least 50 times, it still made me laugh out loud when I saw it in context with the film. Kangaroo Jack is funny and director David McNally did a swell job turning this silly film into something enjoyable to watch.

The movie begins in Australia, but narrator Charlie Carbone (Jerry O’Connell, Tomcats) states his story did not begin here. In fact Charlie takes us back to Brooklyn in 1982 when they were kids. Charlie’s father recently died and his mother (Dyan Cannon, Chicken Run) has started dating mob boss Sal Maggio (Christopher Walken, Joe Dirt). Punk Frankie Lombardo (Micahel Shannon, 8 Mile) tells Charlie to go long and throws a football to Charlie, only it lands in the water as the undertow snatches Charlie and pulls him under. Louis drops everything and saves him. Best friends for life now. Only after that Louis gets Charlie into more trouble than one could possibly imagine. Cut to 20 years later and Sal is now Charlie’s stepfather. Sal bought the hair salon Charlie wanted, only he takes 80% of the profits. Louis gets involved in scams for his uncle that brings both him and Charlie down. The latest scam goes so bad that it costs Sal millions of dollars. As a punishment he sends the two to Australia to deliver $50,000 to Mr. Smith (Marton Csokas, XXX). Well along the way to deliver the money, Charlie hits a kangaroo with his jeep. When they get out to see what happened the dead kangaroo reminds them of Jackie Leggs back in Brooklyn, hence Kangaroo Jack. Well Louis is taking Polaroids of the kangaroo wearing his glasses, then with his shiny red Brooklyn jacket. Only the kangaroo is not dead. When he wakes up the kangaroo freaks out and hops off. They get a good laugh because Jack just kicked Charlie’s ass before hopping away. Louis then remembers the money they were delivering to Mr. Smith is in the jacket. The plot gets funny when Charlie and Louis enlist others to help them recover the jacket. In the meantime Sal has sent Frankie and his goons to get the money and Mr. Smith has plans of his own on getting his money. And what is a comedy without a little romantic fun? So helping the boys find the kangaroo is Jessie (Estella Warren, Driven).

Anderson is hilarious as the screw-up Louis with a heart of gold. O’Connell is especially funny when suffering from heat stroke in the Australian desert. Oh and Kangaroo Jack does not talk or rap as the trailer would suggest. Just like the movie Snow Dogs, the trailer showed the dogs talking and cracking jokes only they didn’t really talk in the film, Jack is rapping and dancing only as a hallucination to Charlie after he had his lights knocked out by Jessie. He was a bad boy. Also appearing in this movie were Bill Hunter, David Ngoombujarra, Mark Sellito, Damien Fotiou, Ryan Gibson, Antonio Vitiello, Mario Di Lenno and Tony Nikolakipoulos.  Steve Bing and Barry O’Brien take credit for the writing, but the entire plot was stupid and predictable. The only thing making this movie fun was the characters and comedic timing. I give Kangaroo Jack a rating of eight couches.

Last updated: Thursday, March 20, 2008 02:46:03 AM

Click Here to get back into frames.