Bowfinger film review

certificate_12

BOWFINGER

Aspiring, 49-year-old and none-too-successful film-maker Bobby Bowfinger (Steve Martin) is in last-ditch territory. He needs to get the greenlight on his latest project or, he fears, movie stardom will forever have passed him by.

He has a script, admittedly written by his accountant Afrim (Adam Alexi-Malle). He has a cast - of sorts, mostly those hanging on Bowfinger's unfulfilled promises. And he has a crew: selected from just over the Mexican border.

But without Hollywood action star Kit Ramsey (Eddie Murphy), Bowfinger can't get the relevant funding. And Ramsey has just kicked him out of a nearly-stationary limo. So desperate measures are taken: Kit Ramsey will be in this picture, he just won't realise it.

Extraordinary guerilla tactics of filming ensue as Ramsey, going about his everyday business, is assailed by actors who appear out of nowhere to spout bizarre dialogue at him - and do nothing to ease his growing paranoia - all captured on a concealed camera.

Indeed, of Bowfinger's unwitting crew themselves, only gofer and confidant Dave (Jamie Kennedy) is in on the ruse.And when Bowfinger stumbles across the nerdy, naive and trusting Jiff, who turns out to be Kit's twin brother, it just offers even more possibilities to the unscrupulous director.

Hollywood making movies about Hollywood always carries a vague whiff of cannibalism, and here Murphy joins the attendant trend frequented recently by Julia Roberts and Danny DeVito - that of playing the number one box office star when you yourself no longer are.

But although set in Hollywood, it doesn't - apart from a couple of digs at the purse-string-holding suits - feel the need to make clever or scathing comment. It's more subtle than basic spoof, and likewise sweeter and more gentle than satire.

It's driven by the characters, too - almost caricatures in places, yes, but Martin's script ensures a knowing element in most, and particularly his conniving director, Murphy's over-inflated star and wannabe starlet Daisy (Heather Graham): that little touch here and there popping them into 3-D.

And there's something about Martin on the con that just clicks. Something about his look, or demeanour, or on-screen personality, that seems suited best of all to this sort of vaguely charming, vaguely desperate, morally AWOL part.