Rating: 
 

The Info

Directed by: Hugh Wilson
Written by: Bill Kelly, Hugh Wilson
Starring: Brendan Fraser, Alicia Silverstone, Christopher Walken, Sissy Spacek, Dave Foley
Produced by: Renny Harlin,  Hugh Wilson
 

The Nutshell

A man hides his family in a bomb shelter for thirty years when he thinks that "the Bomb" has dropped on his town. His son emerges into the world of the 90s after thirty years underground with hilarious results.

The Review

    Blast from the Past is not a new film idea for Brendan Fraser. He has already made several movies about a person from another time or place trying to cope in present day America: Encino Man, in which he played a caveman unfrozen and revived in America, and George of the Jungle, where he played a jungle man brought to America. In both of these cases, Fraser proved that he has good comic timing for the role of the simple idiot. In Blast, he expands this character idea into a new level.

     The movie opens by introducing us to Calvin and Helen Weber (Walken and Spacek), a married couple in the 60s. Calvin is an eccentric inventor who is paranoid about the cold war. He believes that "the Bomb" will drop anyday and he is ready for it. He has built a state-of-the-art bomb shelter under his house. But this is no ordinary run-of-the-mill shelter: it's actually a perfect replica of their house, down to a fake lawn with the lawn chairs set up exactly the same way. One day an airplane drops out of the sky as he and Helen are inside the shelter and crashes into their house, causing an explosion. Paranoid Calvin naturally thinks that the Bomb has dropped and seals them in their shelter for thirty years, the time it theoretically would take for the radiation to dissipate. During their 30 year wait, Helen has a son, Adam (Fraser). He grows up knowing only the shelter and his parents as life on Earth. He naturally longs to head to the surface and hopefully meet another human.

    The bomb shelter part of the film is touching. While Walken and Spacek are hilarious, they actually manage to make us feel sympathy for little Adam growing up in a shelter. Soon enough however the locks open and it is time to inspect the surface. Lots of hilarious pondering about what they will find ensues, including worries about "mutants". Eventually Calvin encounters 90s California and, in seeing the weirdos living in that area of town, assumes that humans have indeed become... different. Adam gets to the surface due to his father falling ill. This is when the film starts to weaken slightly. The humor of Adam's whole first Earth experience is quantitative, not qualitative. Instead of writing subtle, intelligent dialogue, the writers switch to a Naked Gun style of humor where they make every line a joke and fire them off one after another, hoping that some will hit. Unfortunately a lot don't, with way-too-obvious jokes such as Adam's first encounter with a "Negro" being layed one on top of another. This is the film's weakest point.

    The third part of the film picks up again thanks mainly to Dave Foley. Adam encounters a "non-Mutant" woman, Eve (Silverstone) and instantly falls in love. For awhile, the lame jokes continue: for example,  Adam talks with his hand in front of his mouth, since he hasn't brushed his teeth yet (something his parents taught him) which in no way makes us laugh. But as the confusion in Eve about the weird Adam grows, and as his love and gentle obsession for her grows as well, the "first time topside" jokes disappear and Fraser and Silverstone get some decent dialogue. The most laughs, however,  come from Troy (Foley), Eve's gay roommate. He instantly notices the oddness about Adam and his observations are at times mind-numbingly funny. Foley gives Blast its greatest lines and moments and without his presence the film would have withered.

    Credit has to go the casting department here. Not only is Foley perfect as Troy, but as the paranoid Calvin and the slowly-becoming-an-alcoholic, stircrazy Helen, Walken and Spacek are magnificent. Spacek reminds us of her comedic side while Walken puts in of his funner roles in a while, finally shedding his mobster persona. As Adam, Fraser is at times hilarious, at times dull. He has done better comedy in past efforts. Silverstone's Eve is only adequate, as she basically plays the same kind of whiny self-centered character she has almost always played before.

    A sub-plot about the many ways a bar built on top of the bomb shelter changes over the years is side-splittingly funny, as it eventually takes on a religious fervor about the people who "have come from down below". The Weber's unknowingly get a small cult following who believe that they are God, the Mother and The Son come back to Earth, and it was my favorite part of the movie. Couple that to Dave Foley and the Webers and you've got a fairly decent comedy effort. Now if only that romance were more interesting...

Copyright - Tim Chandler

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