Nothing but Trouble

Nothing but Trouble; horror comedy, USA, 1991; D: Dan Aykroyd, S: Chevy Chase, Demi Moore, Dan Aykroyd, John Candy, Taylor Negron, Raymond J. Barry, Brian Doyle-Murray

New York. Chris drives the attractive Diane and two friends, Fausto and Renalda, in his car to Atlantic city. But somewhere around New Jersey, Chris makes a wrong detour and lands in Valkenvania, a bizarre trash town. There they are stopped by the police and brought to the old judge Alvin Valkenheiser. The obviously mad judge takes their documents and puts them in prison. Horrified by the place and it's inhabitants, Chris and Diane find out the judge has been killing people and taking their documents for quite some time. They manage to escape and call the police, but they are also in good relations with the judge. The underground coal fires cause a collapse and destroy the town, while Chris and Diane escape.

When looking back at this senseless film and asked why it was a complete commercial and critical failure, we would have a whole bunch of reasons, out of which probably the biggest ones would be the disgusting characters in disgusting make ups and surroundings of the garbage town Valkenvania, and the fact that the story is simply not funny at all. After a great career in the '80s, Dan Aykroyd made a colossal mistake by directing this awful garbage and got a result of a completely failed film. Quite frankly, the only way to enjoy anything in this black horror comedy is to force yourself that bad is actually good: Aykroyd plays a deranged, 106-year old judge, Alvin, who has a phallic looking nose, John Candy is completely embarrassing and wasted in playing both the cop and the judge's granddaughter Eldona (!), Chevy Chase and Demi Moore don't know what to do with the dreadful material and by the time two new characters are introduced, judge's two deformed, fat, grown up grandchildren in diapers, Bobo and Lil' Debbull, the movie really hits the bottom level of catastrophe. One could see it as a dark grotesque on the corrupt jurisdiction, but when "enriched" with such pointless ideas whose only purpose is to gross out the viewers, nothing really matters anymore. Dan Aykroyd should have really tried to create a better story, instead of forcefully realizing a bad one that should have simply been disposed of.

Grade:-