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Here's all you need to know about Ivan Reitman's new film Evolution. The climactic scene involves David Duchovny and Orlando Jones (the movie's two protagonists) shooting the shampoo Head and Shoulders up the rectum of an enormous alien blob while being completely covered in diarrhea. It's actually grosser than it sounds.

That's only one of many egregious moments in this vile, insipid piece of crap masquerading as a comic blockbuster. "From the director of Ghostbusters," the commercial proudly tells us. What the liars of Hollywood conveniently forget to remind us is that Ghostbusters was almost 20 years ago. Ivan Reitman's more recent output includes the less successful SixDays Seven Nights (it only felt like it), Fathers' Day (an unhappy gift to the patriarchs), and Junior (a prime example of Arnold Schwarzenegger's peculiar comic instincts).

But let's start with the Ghostbusters reference, since it's obvious Evolution hoped to re-create that film's comic magic. Like Ghostbusters, Evolution presents a trio of pseudo-scientists trying to battle an alien force that, if unchecked, could take over the world. It also features a love interest of the main scientist that is a source of physical comedy. Continuing the rip-offs, I mean similarities, the man in charge (here it's an army colonel) is an obnoxious ass whose soul purpose in life is to make our heroes miserable. And the final showdown with the alien involves some very unorthodox science and a bunch of goo. "Ghostbusters meets the X-Files," was probably how it went at the pitch meeting. "Horrible writing meets inept direction" is more like it.

While Ghostbusters had the wonderfully dry wit of Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd, and Harold Ramis, Evolution is stuck with the significantly less talented Duchovny (X-Files), Jones (Say It Isn't So), and Seann William Scott (Road Trip). Actually, it's not completely fair to blame those three, since the screenwriters haven't given them a gag worthy of the Ghostbusters name. But even the lame jokes the script does serve up fall like a lead weight out of their mouths. So the movie turns to the holy trinity of contemporary comedy--vulgarity, stupidity, and genuine viciousness.

Besides the usual jokes about bodily functions and perverted sex, Evolution inverts its name and sinks even lower into the primordial soup. We're supposed to laugh when a man is devoured by an alien, just because he's a rich snob. We're also supposed to laugh at two fat brothers who are so stupid they think a biology paper on cells is supposed to be about prison. When Scott starts making bizarre bird calls to lure a pterodactyl, we're supposed to howl with glee. And we're supposed to ogle a voluptuous co-ed but then conveniently forget about her when her character mysteriously disappears after the film's first fifteen minutes.

The writing in Evolution (courtesy of hacks Don Jakoby, David Diamond, and David Weissman) is truly wretched and the direction isn't any better, but many moviegoers will be fooled by the commercials into forking over their hard-earned $8.75. Why? Because they've been led to believe that you can judge a movie by its trailer. Evolution star Orlando Jones actually said as much last week on television. In defending the studios' use of fake critics in their advertisements, he said he was offended that anyone would actually pay attention to established movie critics: "I don't need someone to tell me whether a movie is good or not. I can watch the trailer, see who's starring, and know if that's a movie I want to see."

Admittedly, I'm biased on this one (as is Jones, who's starred in a string of critic-lambasted flicks), but I find this viewpoint to be utterly fatuous. My experience with trailers is that they often misrepresent the film and always make it seem better than it is. That's particularly true of comedies, where the best parts of the movie are often used up in the commercials. And don't even get me started on critics featured in tv and print advertisements. Even if they're real people (sometimes they're not), they're often paid by the studios and are even given ad copy to write in case they're too lazy to come up with their own.

I'm not saying that you have to take my opinion (or that of any other newspaper critic) as gospel, but don't buy into the notion that the only way you can judge a movie is by its marketing campaign. Hollywood would like you to believe that, but it's simply not so. Particularly with the Internet, there's a wealth of information at your fingertips, information that will help you to avoid rubbish like Evolution. Diarrhea, indeed. 

by J. Robert Parks 6/15/2001