Almovodar has gone back to revisit and try to recapture some of the
daring, humour and subversion of earlier movies to deliver a parable
on the nature of corruption and capitalist collapse. Unfortunately he seems to
have emerged from a journey in the Time Machine Hot Tub rather than The Tardis.
I’m So Excited is a deplorably dated, misjudged and, most crucially,
unfunny attempt at social satire. By conniving to drug the economy class of a
stricken aircraft so they remain unaware of its peril and encouraging the
business class passengers to indulge the last moments of potential demise it
bludgeons the metaphor, but ultimately hits all the wrong notes. In Almovodar’s
worldview the working classes caused the problem through their distracted ineptitude,
remain passive throughout and emerge unscathed and full of gratitude to those
more enlightened who have shepherded them to safety.
Meanwhile in Business Class...alongside a nauseating cabal
including a High-end Madam, dodgy businessman and smarmy hit-man, the depiction
of a group of stereotype airline staff is beyond retrograde. The out, camp
menials provide the hackneyed, supposedly entertaining, alcohol-induced lip-synching
distractions amid a torrent of sexualised one-liners that carry neither wit nor
subtlety and make Are You Being Served look the height of sophistication;
whilst the not-out high flyers do all the necessary high flying in their safe
space of their cockpit closet.
Add to this an embarrassing cocktail and mescaline fuelled orgy
scene that expects us to laugh along at a drug induced rape and we are so far
beneath the barrel it takes all the scrapping we can muster just to get back
into it.
By literally grounding the only partially interesting
character arc, Almovodar inadvertently shows us just how up in the clouds the
rest of his premise is.
I’m So Excited really is a dispiriting and pernicious
experience and yet Almavador has pulled it off Emperor’s New Polyester Uniform style
with the generally positive critical response to this movie. Had this been made
in UK as Carry On Up The Gangway with the likes of David Walliams, Matt Lucas
and Miranda Hart it would have received a reaction akin to Run For Your Wife.
I'm so disappointed.
2/10
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