Moustroll Good movie but grossly overrated

InformationRap This is one of the few movies I've ever seen where the whole audience broke into spontaneous, loud applause a third of the way in.

Calum Hutton It's a good bad... and worth a popcorn matinée. While it's easy to lament what could have been...

Juana what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

aramis-112-804880 "Airplane!" was new and topical. Disaster movies proliferated in the 1970s, especially those set on airplanes. But "Airplane!" was more than a joke-a-minute spoof. Its vision was scattershot, taking in several genres; and it was more-than-a-joke-a-minute. "Airplane!" threw jokes out wildly. Some failed, but another would be along any moment. No one had made a movie like that since the Marx Brothers, and their work often plays too slow today, because the Marxes tested their jokes before live audiences (in the day before everyone had recording tools or an internet) and they left spaces after the good jokes for laughs that are simply leaden on television.But "Airplane!" and its successors (especially "Police Squad" and its "Naked Gun" franchise spinoffs and the "Hot Shots" movies) led viewers to nestle into our seat expecting to be bowled over from laughs. It was an impossible feat to keep up. "Airplane!" hit the screens in 1980. "Mafia!" (or "Jane Austen's Mafia!" after a rash of Jane Austen flicks) shyly poked its head out in 1998, long enough for viewers to be born and grow up on this humor, and pay for their own tickets to "the next one." Had this movie come out twenty years earlier, when the "Godfather" movies were fairly new and topical, it might have been acclaimed the comedy of the year. Now, it seems like too little (too few jokes) far too late. We have a feeling we've seen it all before.Frankly, as someone who was 18/19 in 1980, when this sort of humor was new, I've grown tired of scatological humor, probably having seen too much of it. Beyond that, the film looks great! The "Godfather II" spoof of the early life of Don Cortino is spot-on, and it's good to see children treated with disrespect. It's the sort of hallmark we've come to expect from Abrahams.Lloyd Bridges (in, unfortunately for us, his last filmed role) plays Cortino as an adult, and "The Godfather"-spoof shots are recreated in loving detail. However, for comic effect (and here's a spoiler), the shooting scene goes on too long, and once started it gets old quickly (though the "Say hello to my little friend" line from "Scarface" was welcome).The rest of the movie follows "The Godfather" and "Godfather II" a little too closely. They needed more silly digressions of the "Airplane!" type. And are there enough jokes, or are we viewers too demanding? Are Abrahams' movies like a drink addiction, where we have to have more and more swigs of it to have the same effect?In any case, it's a long-delayed spoof of gangland movies, but it didn't have the same devastating effect "Airplane!" had on disaster movies by highlighting their innate silliness. Most gangland movies are, at bottom, pretty dumb. Perhaps Abrams and his writers never found the true essence of stupidity at their core and wound up degenerating into a series of pratfalls, as happened with the later "Pink Panther" movies.Lloyd Bridges also tumbled into the snare Leslie Nielsen found. Originally chosen for "Airplane!" because they had never done a funny thing on camera in their lives, playing po-faced versions of their normally straight-laced characters, they leaned more and more on mugging in their later comedy roles, trying to look stupid as well as say illogical lines. It's too bad Peter Sellers died before Abrahams' movies hit the screen. The best slapstick movie comedian since the silent days, Sellers would have felt right at home.So whether Abrahams simply didn't find "The Godfather" and its successors as innately foolish as disaster movies (where's the counterpart to "who didn't have fish for dinner" line?) or whether we as his loyal audience are simply looking for more jokes than a single movie can bear, or whether by 1998 the Farrelly brothers had the hot new thing going ("There's something About Mary" wsa released in the same year as "Mafia!") there's a feeling "Mafia!" simply isn't as much as it could be. That's too bad because it's a good idea, and because "Godfather" sets, clothing and hairstyles are beautifully recreated.

Scott LeBrun This send-up of mafia movies ranging from the "Godfather" series to "GoodFellas" and "Casino" and their ilk is mildly funny. It might have been better, but too many of the gags are surprisingly silly and immature. You expect more from co-writer / director Jim Abrahams, who'd done better work with the Zucker brothers ("Airplane!") and even on his own ("Hot Shots!" 1 and 2). There are some decent gags here and there, but on the whole the movie fails to really catch fire. They are to be commended, though, for trying so hard to get the right *look* for various locations at various points in time.Also working in references to "Jaws", the "Child's Play" series, "The Lost World: Jurassic Park", and "Forrest Gump", the story tells of the Michael Corleone-like character Anthony Cortino (ever likable Jay Mohr), son of prominent mafia Don Vincenzo Cortino (Lloyd Bridges, typically amusing). Anthony returns home after military service, soon getting drawn into the world of organized crime.A ready and willing cast of familiar faces gives the so-so material some entertainment value: Christina Applegate, Billy Burke, Pamela Gidley, Olympia Dukakis, Joe Viterelli, Tony Lo Bianco, Vincent Pastore, Carol Ann Susi, Gregory Sierra, Louis Mandylor, and Andreas Katsulas. Sadly, this was Bridges's last movie, and it's dedicated to him; his scenes tend to be the better ones. Unfortunately, Dukakis is given almost nothing to do.Complete with an expected raft of uncredited cameo appearances, "Jane Austen's Mafia!" is passable, but it's absolutely no "Airplane!".Six out of 10.

wes-connors Las Vegas casino owner Jay Mohr (as Anthony "Tony" Cortino) starts his car and it explodes. He miraculously survives, and continues to narrate the story of his family. We flashback… to see how Mr. Mohr's father became involved with organized crime. The klutzy boy Jason Fuchs (as Little Vincenzo Cortino) causes accidents everywhere he goes. Volunteering to deliver a package for his dimwit dad, young Fuchs trips and dumps the white powdery contents for sheep to eat and become intoxicated. Fuchs is targeted for death, but escapes to America, where he eventually becomes an unlikely mob boss...This is mainly a spoof of "The Godfather" films. Mohr plays the Michael (Al Pacino) role and his father grows up to be Lloyd Bridges (as Vincenzo Cortino) in "The Godfather" (Marlon Brando) role...The opening and first flashback are funny, with some nice art/set direction and stunts. Alas, the story quickly gets bogged down with anal jokes. It's also sad to see Mr. Bridges, in his 80s and near death, given such stupid character to work with. His stunt double is painfully obvious. There is good work from brother Billy Burke (as Joey Cortino), pretty Christina Applegate (as Diane Keaton, oops, Steen) and sexy Pamela Gidley (as Pepper Gianini). At least, they get some interesting material to work with. Grand-motherly Olympia Dukakis (as Sophia) is made to wash down broccoli with prune juice.*** Mafia! (7/24/98) Jim Abrahams ~ Jay Mohr, Billy Burke, Christina Applegate, Lloyd Bridges

ccthemovieman-1 Here's a very funny spoof on The Godfather story. This is a Leslie Nielsen-type silly parody, except the late Lloyd Bridges played the lead role instead Nielson.Actually Jay Mohr was more of the lead actor in here, narrating the film and taking Al Pacino's Godfather role while Christina Applegate took Diane Keaton's character. There are a number of laugh-out-loud lines in this movie and a number of overdone slapstick scenes. As with any comedy in which the material comes at you at a rapid pace (see the Marx Brothers films from 70 years ago to see some of the origins of comedic mayhem), you get a lot funny and not-so-funny. They come at you so fast you can hardly keep up. I found that there were a lot of funny lines written on background buildings, street signs, etc. on this film. You almost have to freeze-frame some scenes to "read" all the jokes, much less hear them.This movie did do something that Hollywood films rarely have done: poke fun at a Democrat. Usually, the cheap shots are reserved for Republcians (Nixon, Gingrich, Reagan, Bush, etc) but here we have the famous "But I never had sex with that woman!" line delivered in a obvious reference. Well, good for them. About time the Liberals were recipients of a cheap shot or two. It only happens about once every 25 years in films. So, I give this film points for being "fair and balanced."Also points should be awarded for having several actors from the actual Godfather films make appearances here, too. The film was dedicated "in loving memory" to Bridges, so I assume this was his last movie. Well, he certainly went out with a laugh.