"Meet Dave", Eddie Murphy's Latest Failure

According to an age-old Hollywood maxim, it's just as hard to make a bad movie as a good one. If true, I guess we can't accuse anyone of slacking off at 20th Century Fox. The box-office jury is still out on "Meet Dave," but the critics have weighed in: The sci-fi comedy -- about an alien spaceship that looks like, well, like Eddie Murphy -- is a stinker.

Eddie Murphy's latest movie, which is a B comedy about an alien ship disguised as... Eddie Murphy, with a captain who is a tiny Eddie Murphy, bombs all the way. Meet Dave is disappointing especially because Eddie Murphy is one of the actors who could indeed put out something valuable, but apparently he doesn't care and is in it totally for the money.

The story line is childish, but that wouldn't be a problem as, after all, we're talking about a Hollywood comedy. Aliens come to Earth to steal our natural resources in order to save their home planet. The alien crew creates Dave Ming Chang who looks like a human being but is just a machine and tries to control his moves so he doesn’t look suspicious. At first, his moves are a little stiff and weird… and somewhat funny, maybe, for those who dig this type of very basic humor.

The small creatures, that come from the Planet Nill to find an orb which will suck the salt water from the oceans in order to be used by Nillians, are very serious at the beginning but, as they get to spend more time on Earth among people, they start to integrate and turn out to be as stupid as we are.

While he tries to be human, the Dave-ship begins to experience some warm feelings regarding Gina Morrison, a single mom played by Elizabeth Banks. The mini- Dave, the captain of the alien crew, also played by Eddie Murphy, is secretly fancied by his cultural officer (Gabrielle Union).

The movie shows Murphy's primary strength, or maybe his real acting passion: physical comedy. There's also his obsession with multiple roles (maybe he liked that scene in Being John Malkovich). The gags are usually lame, managing to produce smiles quite rarely.

Everybody seemed to notice that the Dave-ship performance was probably inspired by Steve Martin wrestling with himself in "All of Me."

The movie is, overall, another waste of talents, not just of Murphy's (we already got used to that) but also of his fellow actors. It's quite appalling that money, time and energy are put to such a waste, when with a little more effort and will, a much better comedy could have emerged. It seems that Murphy and Co. do not care about their reputation and their career, and are just out for a quick buck.

MPAA rating: PG for bawdy and suggestive humor, action and some language.
Running time: 1 hour, 30 minutes
Starring Eddie Murphy, Elizabeth Banks, Gabrielle Union and Scott Caan
Directed by: Brian Robbins
Written by: Rob Greenberg and Bill Corbett
Release Date: 11 July

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Tony Snow Lost Battle To Cancer At 53


Fox News reports that former talk show host, Tony Snow, died earlier this morning from complications related to an ongoing battle with cancer. He was 53.

A syndicated columnist, editor, TV anchor, radio show host and musician, Snow worked in nearly every medium in a career that spanned more than 30 years.

Snow joined FOX in 1996 as the original anchor of FOX News Sunday, and hosted Weekend Live and a radio program, The Tony Snow Show, before departing in 2006. A sometime fill-in host for Rush Limbaugh, Snow said he loved the intimacy of his radio audience.

"It's a tremendous loss for us who knew him, but it's also a loss for the country," Roger Ailes, Chairman of FOX News, said Saturday morning about Snow, calling him a "renaissance man."

As a TV pundit and commentator for FOX News, Snow was often critical of President Bush before he became Bush's third press secretary in 2006, following Ari Fleischer and Scott McClellan. He was an instant study in the job, mastering the position — and the White House press corps — with apparent ease.

During a tenure marked by friendly jousting with journalists, Snow often danced around the press corps, occasionally correcting their grammar and speech even as he responded to their questions.

"Tony did his job with more flair than almost any press secretary before him," said William McGurn, Bush's former chief speechwriter. "He loved the give-and-take. But that was possible only because Tony was a man of substance, who had real beliefs and principles that he was more than able to defend."

As he announced Snow as his new press secretary in 2006, President Bush praised him as "a man of courage [and] a man of integrity." Snow presided over some of the toughest fights of Bush's presidency, defending the administration during the Iraq War and the CIA leak investigation.

Robert Anthony Snow was born June 1, 1955, in Berea, Ky., the son of a teacher and nurse. He graduated from Davidson College in 1977 with a bachelor's degree in philosophy, and he taught briefly in Kenya before embarking on his career as a journalist.

Because of his love for writing, Snow took a job as an editorial writer for the Greensboro Record in North Carolina, and went on to run the editorial pages at the Newport News (Virginia) Daily Press, Detroit News and Washington Times. He became a nationally syndicated columnist, and in 1991 he became director of speechwriting for President George H.W. Bush.

Snow had his colon removed and underwent six months of chemotherapy after he was diagnosed with colon cancer in 2005. In 2007, he announced that his cancer had recurred and had spread to his liver. He resigned from the White House weeks later and was replaced by his deputy, Dana Perino.

After taking time off to recuperate, Snow joined CNN as a conservative political correspondent early this year.

Snow is survived by his wife, Jill Ellen Walker, whom he married in 1987, and their son Robbie and their daughters Kendell and Christie.

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