Dudley Do-Right (1999)

There was something about 1999 that made it a special year.  Most of that was due to the turn of the millennium coming up in less than 12 months.  People were worried about the whole Y2K thing because it was the first change of centuries where computers existed.  What would happen when the dates, which were programmed to the last two digits of the year, rolled back to 00?  Would it mess up everything we knew?  There were fears that power grids would shut down and infrastructure would fall apart.  But everyone was excited at the time for the future.  The 21^st century would bring new things, and they wanted to see them.

That wasn’t the only thing that made 1999 interesting, though.  For moviegoers, Star Wars was back.  The Phantom Menace had been released after the franchise lay theatrically dormant for sixteen years.  The Matrix was changing what action movies could be.  The Blair Witch Project brought found footage horror to the mainstream, and The Sixth Sense made M. Night Shyamalan a sought-after voice.  There were a bunch of big movies, and a bunch of big stars.

One actor who was at the peak of his career in 1999 was Brendan Fraser.  Fraser had been in movies since the beginning of the decade.  Encino Man, School Ties, and Airheads helped make him a commodity that studios would go after to be in their films.  That all came to a head in 1999 when he would star in three movies that would become some of the most memorable of his career.  The Mummy went down as a near classic, with people still watching and enjoying it.  Blast from the Past was an interesting fish-out-of-water story.  Then there was Dudley Do-Right.

Dudley Do-Right was a live-action adaptation of a segment from the animated series The Adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle.  Brendan Fraser starred as Dudley Do-Right, a Canadian Mountie living in a small town.  A modern goldrush was taking place and there was an influx of tourists coming to get their share of the riches.  Snidely Whiplash (Alfred Molina) was there to take over the town and get all the money, as well as win over Dudley’s childhood love Nell Fenwick (Sarah Jessica Parker).  Now it was up to Dudley to get Snidely out of the town and win back the heart of the girl he loved.

Very few people in film manage to have a perfect batting percentage.  Brendan Fraser’s 1999 was no different.  Though The Mummy and Blast From the Past were well enough received to garner watches beyond their theatrical run, Dudley Do-Right was the movie that squandered the perfect score.  It received mixed reviews, with most people falling on the side of it being simple, low-hanging comedy.  Very few people actually saw it in the theater, which caused it to only make $10 million off of a $70 million budget.

The thing is, critics tend to be adults.  I’m not saying that adults can’t enjoy films geared at children.  The Pixar movies have more than proved that someone can write a script that appeals to both kids and adults.  But Dudley Do-Right was directed solely at children.  It was a live-action version of a cartoon that played very much like a Saturday morning cartoon.  The jokes played to kids in a slapstick way that they would love.  It makes sense that it didn’t connect with the adults who had to review it.

The fact that it was based on a children’s cartoon from the late 1950s was a major part of what made Dudley Do-Right a pure children’s movie.  The source material was for children and, aside from the live-action filming, the movie adhered to the same sort of mindset.  The themes were fairly wholesome.  The story was basic.  The characters weren’t deep.  It was very surface level so that the children of 1999 could keep up with what was going on.

That began with the characters.  Dudley Do-Right was the good guy.  That’s who he was framed as.  His last name was even made to be Do-Right because he always did the right things.  He valued the good around him and feared the vampires that were out there.  I never saw any vampires in the movie.  I’m unsure they even existed.  But he was afraid of them.  The villain was Snidely Whiplash who was only doing bad guy things because he thought being a bad guy was more fun than being a good guy.  His plans made it seem like he was into it for money, but he wasn’t.  He simply wanted to play the bad guy role to Dudley’s good guy role.  Then there was Nell, who was the simple damsel.  She was the woman that both the hero and villain pined for.  Simple characters for a simple movie, so that children would easily understand what was happening.

Dudley did change slightly in the movie, channelling his inner bad boy.  He started wearing black instead of his normal plaid or Mountie red.  He threatened people.  He rode a motorcycle.  And he used a gun.  He made Snidely Whiplash nervous because people found Dudley to be more of a bad guy than Snidely.  The thing is, Dudley’s bad was still kind of wholesome.  Aside from the gun thing, which was weird.  His threat was with a saw that would cut a man in half.  Until the saw was revealed to be papier-mache.  The motorcycle was used to ride away with Nell after using a chainsaw to sculpt her likeness out of a bush.  For the most part, he wasn’t harming anyone with his antics.  He was still being respectful while being disrespectful.  This was so that kids would know to always be nice.

The other major factor that made it apparent that Dudley Do-Right was a movie meant for children and not the adult critics was the slapstick humour.  Some of it was based on cartoon style visuals.  There was a moment when Snidely Whiplash scared Dudley’s horse and it ran away, leaving a horse shaped hole in the barn wall.  One scene had Snidely threatening someone by tying them to the train tracks while a train was coming, which is a classic cartoon villain thing.  Then there were the physical jokes where people, mostly Dudley, would get hit with something.  He would walk onto a loose board in the floor, which would come up and hit him in the face.  He would be hit with a rock while training to be bad.  He would be hit with sticks while blindfolded.  Children love cartoon humour and people getting hurt in a joking way.  Dudley Do-Right played right into that.

Critics were hard on Dudley Do-Right when it came out.  To be fair, it’s not the best movie of its kind.  There have been better movies to emulate cartoon aesthetics in live action scenarios.  But there were some good things in there that people of all ages could appreciate.  The chainsaw bush cutting scene was pretty great, from the black and navy joke all the way to the final swipe of the chainsaw to cockily cut the final tendril of a perfect sculpture.  Then there was a stunt at the end where Dudley rode his horse between two tanks that simultaneously blew each other up.  Oh, and the dance scene in the middle of the movie where Dudley and Snidely were both trying to dance with Nell, that had people swapping partners continuously.  It was a fun sequence.

Brendan Fraser’s big blunder of 1999 was Dudley Do-Right.  His other two movies found more success.  Blast from the Past got mixed reviews but was praised for what it tried to do.  The Mummy was much more successful, spawning a three-film series, and a spin-off series for The Scorpion King.  It became what Brendan Fraser became known for.  He was known for a good while as that guy from The Mummy.

1999 was a year that shaped the careers of many people.  It had some game-changing movies, and a lot of cultural panic as the new millennium loomed over everyone.  Nobody knew what the next year would bring.  The question of how the world would change due to Y2K was thrown about as a common conversation topic.  In the end, things went on as they had the year before.  There were more movies shaping more filmmakers.  There were more people panicking about more things.  It was more of the same.  And that’s okay because some good, some bad, and some right-down-the-middle stuff happened that made the world what it is.  You’re here and I’m here, so it’s not all bad.  Right?

These notes shouldn’t be too bad either:

• Dudley Do-Right was the third Sunday “Bad” Movie for actor Brendan Fraser.  You may remember that he showed up in Furry Vengeance (week 162) and Son in Law (week 251).
• Regis Philbin is another three-timer, making an appearance in Dudley Do-Right after being in Jack and Jill (week 101) and Sextette (week 141).
• Dudley Do-Right saw the return of Eric Brecker who was also in Ballistic: Ecks vs. Sever (week 33) and Jingle All the Way 2 (week 160).
• Eric Idle returned this week, having already been in Delgo (week 148) and Mom and Dad Save the World (week 186).
• Yet another three-timer was Bryan Anthony who was in Dudley Do-Right, Showgirls (week 170), and Bucky Larson: Born to Be a Star (week 221).
• Did you know that Don Yesso has now been in three Sunday “Bad” Movies, with the inclusion of Dudley Do-Right?  His other appearances were Fant4stic (week 172) and American Ultra (week 261).
• The final new three-timer this week was Artine Tony Browne, who had previously been in Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2 (week 50) and Snow Dogs (week 322).
• Sarah Jessica Parker played Nell in Dudley Do-Right.  She was also in New Year’s Eve (week 57).
• Lisa Ratzin made her second Sunday “Bad” Movies appearance this week.  She had already been in Showgirls (week 170).
• This wasn’t the first movie to feature Alfred Molina.  He had already played a role in Cabin Boy (week 173).
• Dudley Do-Right featured Anne Fletcher, who was in Catwoman (week 174).
• Television host Kathie Lee Gifford has now been in two Sunday “Bad” Movies.  They were Dudley Do-Right and Sharknado 3: Oh Hell No! (week 190).
• Do you know C. Ernst Harth?  He has been in Space Buddies (week 270) and Dudley Do-Right.
• Erik Hyler popped up again this week after having shown up in Wild Wild West (week 296).
• Finally, there was Oscar Goncalves.  He was in Dudley Do-Right and Snow Dogs (week 322).
• Have you seen Dudley Do-Right?  What did you think of it?  Was it a good adaptation of a cartoon, or did you dislike it?  Let me know in the comments or on Twitter.
• You can use those two places to give suggestions, as well.  If there’s a movie that you think I should be checking out for the Sunday “Bad” Movies, let me know about it.  I’ll be happy to consider it and maybe schedule it.
• There’s an Instagram account for the Sunday “Bad” Movies that you can check out.
• Now let’s talk about next week.  It has been a while since I checked out anything from the Lifetime channel, so I thought now would be as good a time as any to jump into their backlog once again.  That’s why I shall be covering The Unauthorized Saved by the Bell Story.  You’ll read my thoughts next Sunday.  See you then.