Eddie Murphy Movie:

Editorial Review:
Meet Dave is a family space farce with enough Eddie Murphy slapstick to make the whole family chuckle. With elements of InnerSpace, Starman, Men in Black, and even a bit of Woody Allen's Everything You Wanted to Know About Sex, the film may not break new ground, but Murphy's giddy performance lifts the material to an engaging level. Murphy plays a space ship in human form, carrying wee aliens on an excursion to earth. As "Dave Ming Chang," he interacts with his surroundings and fellow humans by following the orders given by the ship's commanders inside his "head." It's an endearing fish-out-of-water yarn that riffs of pop culture as well as potty humor for its laughs. ("Lieutenant Bottoms, what is your status?" "Captain, we had a small gas leak. It was silent, but not deadly.")

In the course of his mission, Dave is hit by a car, becomes a substitute teacher in a New York City public school, and starts to develop feelings for earth kids--and ladies. All the while his homage to the Bee Gees, from the white suit to his high-pitch-perfect rendition of "Stayin' Alive," provides an oddly perfect backdrop and symbol for Dave's being ever so slightly behind the times. Murphy is engaging as always, firing off deadpan one-liners and happily being the straight man to the film's jokes. A potential love interest, Gina (Elizabeth Banks), mentions that her late husband was a captain in the Navy. Dave says, "I am a captain." Gina: "Oh really? A captain of what?" Inside Dave's head, the crewmembers frantically search their earth database to give him the answer: "I am a captain of crunch." --A.T. Hurley

Meet Dave [Theatrical Release] Reviews:
The Little People have landed
2008-08-06 - In a spaceship named 'Dave' the very small people have come to
rob us of our oceans using an 'orb' in a evil plot.
The funny part is the interaction of a black Captain Picard
with a boy and his mother that results in the humanization
of the whole crew save for number 2.
But will the captain save this world that his giant friends live on
or will the planet be sucked dry by the orb?
Eddie Murphy is kind of mechanical, but the plot is
in a long tradition of slap stick sci fi.
I liked it as a kid's movie.

Silly and dumb, wrapped in one
2008-07-21 - The Nillians land on Liberty Island several months after a probe sent into the atmosphere to save their dying planet. The probe, we later learn, is capable of siphoning dry the oceans, and sending the residue salt back to Nil, human life be damned.

The space ship is in the human-sized form of The Nils' captain (Eddie Murphy) who is actually smaller than Tom Thumb or even Stuart Little.

The probe is mistaken for a meteorite by the school boy Josh (Austin Lynd Myers), in whose fish bowl it lands.

But strange things begin to happen to the Nillians on Earth, as they grow increasingly infected with the human spirit. And even stranger things happen to the human-sized space ship looking like Eddie Murphy.

This is silly, space-age slapstick humor. And if you did not like early 20th century slapstick, you will most certainly dislike the computer-driven variety.

Even so, Dave, the name the Nillian captain assumes for his space-ship, says some very heart-warming things to Josh, as the captain eventually does to the numbered Nillian characters who've joined him on this adventure.

This is a silly movie, dumb even. Still, it has its redeeming moments, and I can think of worse ways to spend a sticky, brutally hot summer afternoon than watching this film.

The Man Who Fell to Earth
2008-07-17 - A race of tiny aliens comes to Earth in a spaceship made to look like an average sized human man. The ship walks and talks but sticks out like a sore thumb, and the attempts to fit in only make things worse. Perfect family fare, right? Well, maybe not perfect, but it certainly is an interesting idea, especially for kids. But it didn't seem to work for "Meet Dave," a light-hearted sci-fi tale that doesn't really know what audience it's gearing itself towards. While there's no language or nudity, and while the violence is minimal, I'm hard pressed to say that it was meant for kids; save for a few physical gags and some nice special effects, there's isn't much for them to find entertaining. This goes double for the adults taking their kids to see it. Actually, it goes triple, maybe more. "Meet Dave" is a lost and confused film, with an ambitious story that goes absolutely nowhere and characters that don't fit in.

The story begins when a baseball-sized meteorite flies through the window of a New York City apartment, almost killing a young boy named Josh (Austin Lynd Myers). A month or so later, another object crash lands on Liberty Island--a man-shaped spaceship crewed by a miniature humanoid species from the planet Nil. The captain (Eddie Murphy) is on a mission to save his world, which needs abundant sources of salt to survive. He and his crew must locate and retrieve the meteorite and use it to completely absorb the oceans. Earth will be destroyed, but Nil will be saved. As the ship (also played by Eddie Murphy) lumbers around the city dressed in an out-of-style white suit, Josh's mother, Gina (Elizabeth Banks), accidentally plows her car into it. This "man" is fine, thank goodness, but she still offers to take him up to her apartment. Through a speaker system hooked to the ship's mouth, the captain speaks to Gina, telling her his name is Ming Chang. She says he looks more like a Dave, and he immediately tells her that that's his other name.

The captain then notices a picture of Josh holding the meteorite, and you'd think the plot would finally kick into high gear at that point, but no--we still have to endure a number of scenes that exploit "Dave's" ignorance of human culture, such as shaking hands and getting dressed and eating. We also have to endure a number of jokes that aren't funny at all. One example: to pay for new clothing, "Dave" scans a stray twenty dollar bill and loose change, replicates them, then expels the copies via "his" rear end. Another example, this one also involving defecation: after winning a hot dog-eating contest, "Dave" enters the restroom and proctologicly projects every hot dog into the toilet. "Show off," says the man in the neighboring stall. Yet another example: one of the ship's crewmembers is named Lieutenant Buttocks, and when the captain demands a damage report, Buttocks replies, "We have a gas leak, sir. It's silent, but not deadly." Buttocks, by the way, works in the nether regions of the ship. And his pants are too low.

At this point, "Dave" has befriended Josh, who apparently needs a hero since his father is no longer in the picture. As cliché as it would have been, it would have been nice for this subplot to have been developed a bit more. As it stands, it's a mere blip in the story, so inconsequential it's a wonder the filmmakers were compelled to include it. The same can be said about most of the characters. Gina, it seems, used to be an artist, and when "Dave" returns to her apartment, "he" stares at one of her paintings in awe, trying to make sense of what she was feeling when she created it. This is about as deep as Gina gets; she spends the rest of the film in a confused stupor, blindly accepting everything "Dave" does, including his inability to speak like a normal human being. The implication is that she's falling in love with him, but it's impossible to believe. So is Mark (Marc Blucas), the other man in the story--he's featured so infrequently that I never believed he felt anything for Gina.

And then there's the "Dave" crew, a mishmash of quirky personalities confined in the same space. The second in command, No. 2 (Ed Helms), is hostile and bitter, especially when the captain begins to show compassion for the people of Earth. The cultural officer, No. 3 (Gabrielle Union), is annoyed because the captain doesn't realize she has feelings for him. The security officer, No. 4 (Pat Kilbane), is one of the biggest gay stereotypes ever. No. 17 (Kevin Hart) is just an extraneous side character that was given one or two amusing lines.

A subplot involving two cops is interwoven throughout the film. They're sent to investigate the unexplained crater on Liberty Island. While the overweight Knox (Mike O'Malley) thinks nothing of it (or of his own job, for that matter), his partner, the muscular Dooley (Scott Caan), immediately concludes that the crater was the result of extra-terrestrial activity. How he came to believe this and why, I have no idea. Not that it matters a great deal, seeing as this unassuming cop looks, sounds, and behaves nothing like a UFO conspiracy theorist. He was phony, much like everyone else in this film. The film itself is phony, even as far as sci-fi fantasies go. "Meet Dave" was obviously supposed to be an entertaining family comedy, and I'm sure it could have been were it a bit more focused. But it's just plain pathetic, much like the title character's attempts at blending in.

This Really Happening Everywhere These Days,
2008-07-15 - This film shows the adventures of an alien who used the name given him (you look lie a Dave). As his ship a silver ball, flew across the skyline in New York City it landed on Liberty Island and was found by a precocious, fatherless boy, Josh.

Inside Dave's head were a computer team using outdated Google as their source of information (quite out-of-date). And Dave was transformed into Travolta all in white with pretty, old acccruments: tie, pockethandkerchief, etc. Eddie Murphy played this serious situation down key as he used his superpowers.

Can an alien feel? He was a walking encyclopedia but very little emotion, just wide open eyes. It took a pretty woman to make him a man. In that busy city, he was in several predicaments where chaos reigned supreme by walking across the street against the traffic light. It was the order of the day for pedestrians to walk swiftly through the cars, like some of us do on Gay Street. He would have been right at home in Knoxville where the natives jaywalk most of the time. He was hit by a woman driver, mother of pre-teen Josh who sported hair like mine. Frank had died, but "we're okay."

Up in control central, #4 looked like Mark in uniform and had his talents of subterfuge. Mark Rhodes was one of the aliens good at a charade. They both had taken dancing lessons, image that? At times, the police gave him problems. Handsome Harry in New York was just like ours. Welcome to Earth. They tried to make him believe "we're all your friends" unlike here. We saw anarchy in progress on the space area inside Dave's head. He was invincible and oblivious; his encounter with a New York city bus was unbievable to anyone who has never ridden a big city bus.

He reported to control that "things are changed" as he turns into a super hero for Josh, who was able to recover the silver ball from the bullies. Dave became Off Balance and spent one night in an alley beside what he called an urban camper -- a homeless American man.

As friendship turned into more between Dave and Josh's mom, he thought of as kind, intelligent and beautiful (marriageable). He had found his soul mate and felt that he was sent there for a purpose. He knew the right thing to do, but we weren't shown the result or how he overcame his defictiences in human interaction.

After he moved from man/woman friendship, he had discovered that "true love conquers all." Alas, he was not allowed to become human. I believe there are such creatures, and I've run into a few, women and men. It's strange the outer appearances they choose to fit in, the female was a short Dolly Parton, busom and all. The men are homeless and lost, but can cope to confuse the natives and obtain jobs in places where noone pays much attention, taking them for granted.

I enjoyed DAVE to confirm my wondering about these abnormal beings. May God look after them and keep us safe.

Could have been subtitled: Aliens in a space ship that looked a lot like me
2008-07-13 - Eddie Murphy's done some funny films and he's done some clunkers. "Meet Dave" falls pretty squarely in the middle of the road. The story's about a group of aliens from the planet Nil who come to Earth to find a probe they've sent here. This probe is set to drain the planet of all its salt so Nil can restore itself to its former glory.

Sound a bit familar? "Meet Dave" is a bit of current politics and a bit "Inner Space" with a different craft to fly. What makes it work is the huge alien in New York than only one cop, Officer Dooley (Caan) is onto.

"Meet Dave" is a funny farce that the whole family can enjoy. Just a bit of bawdy humor, but the kind juveniles enjoy.


Rebecca Kyle, July 2008