Space Jam: A New Legacy: Film Review
Cast: LeBron James, Don Cheadle, Cedric Joe, Bugs Bunny, The Looney tunes gang, The Entire WB Back catalogue
Director: Malcolm D Lee
There’s little in the overlong Space Jam: A New legacy that feels overly vital - and there's a lot that feels like Warner Bros is trying to promote a massive back catalogue and show off how many assets it owns.
Essentially a story of LeBron James’ father being taught to listen more to his son Dom, not dominate his will and engage his goofier side more, the Space Jam sequel takes a long time to build up to its courtside showdown.
Masterminding a rift between James sr and James Jr (Cedric Joe) is an overly hyper Don Cheadle as a computer algorithm (Mr Al G Rhythm, yes really) who manufactures a scheme to trap them in his computer world and succeeds.
But when LeBron James teams up with Bugs Bunny who’s been abandoned by the other Looney Tunes, characters, the film starts to find some of its rhythm
Essentially an Avengers Assemble style squad story that builds into a bball throwdown, space jam new legacy spends an inordinate amount of time pushing product and prevaricating its story.
Some of the product push is inspired - most notably a Mad Max Fury Road Road Runner moment is worth the price of admission alone, even though it lasts only 30 seconds.
When the script plays fast and loose with what makes the various looney tunes characters so affable and frantic, it soars; when it dips into tedious message delivery and lecture learning it lands flat because James doesn’t have the emotive range to carry it off.
Depressingly every single piece of Warner Bros IP is pushed to the nth degree; a sign that Mega-conglomerate franchise owners only care about spinoff potential and merchandise rather than taking custodial care of their best, using them all to push their HBO Max back catalogue.
Space Jam: A New Legacy may lack the goofiness of the 90s original (though one nod to the original stars is inspired brilliance) and be about 30 minutes too long, but when it occasionally truly fires, there’s more of a slam dunk of a family film here than you’d expect.
Essentially a story of LeBron James’ father being taught to listen more to his son Dom, not dominate his will and engage his goofier side more, the Space Jam sequel takes a long time to build up to its courtside showdown.
Masterminding a rift between James sr and James Jr (Cedric Joe) is an overly hyper Don Cheadle as a computer algorithm (Mr Al G Rhythm, yes really) who manufactures a scheme to trap them in his computer world and succeeds.
But when LeBron James teams up with Bugs Bunny who’s been abandoned by the other Looney Tunes, characters, the film starts to find some of its rhythm
Essentially an Avengers Assemble style squad story that builds into a bball throwdown, space jam new legacy spends an inordinate amount of time pushing product and prevaricating its story.
Some of the product push is inspired - most notably a Mad Max Fury Road Road Runner moment is worth the price of admission alone, even though it lasts only 30 seconds.
When the script plays fast and loose with what makes the various looney tunes characters so affable and frantic, it soars; when it dips into tedious message delivery and lecture learning it lands flat because James doesn’t have the emotive range to carry it off.
Depressingly every single piece of Warner Bros IP is pushed to the nth degree; a sign that Mega-conglomerate franchise owners only care about spinoff potential and merchandise rather than taking custodial care of their best, using them all to push their HBO Max back catalogue.
Space Jam: A New Legacy may lack the goofiness of the 90s original (though one nod to the original stars is inspired brilliance) and be about 30 minutes too long, but when it occasionally truly fires, there’s more of a slam dunk of a family film here than you’d expect.
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