Maybe you've seen the previews and thought, 'Hey, it could be kind of funny. Carvey was hilarious on Saturday Night Live'. Yes, Carvey was hilarious on SNL...so much so that when he was the guest on Dennis Miller Live a few weeks ago, fellow SNL-alum Miller declared him to be night-in, night-out the funniest performer the show has ever had. And he might be right. But Carvey, like so many SNL-ers, has never been able to translate his comedic talents to the big screen (Clean Slate, Opportunity Knocks, Trapped In Paradise).
Here Carvey plays Pistachio Disguisey, a bumbling waiter who can't figure out why he is compelled to constantly imitate his patrons. When his father and mother (James Brolin and Edie McClurg) are kidnapped by a flatulently-challenged villain (Brent Spiner), he has to discover his family heritage and learn how to become a true Master of Disguise in order to rescue them.
The movie is an embarrassing jumble of loosely connected bits intended to showcase Carvey's sharp mimicry skills. The problem is that while it's great fun to watch someone effectively lampoon people you recognize, it's almost zero fun watching someone satirize generic "everyday" characters - an overweight Texan and his gum-flappin' wife in a fine Italian restaurant who just want "the spaghetti," for example. It might work in a 3-minute SNL skit, but over the course of a whole movie, the characters just grow tiresome.
Curiously, Disguise's few memorable bits are homages to other movies (none of which have any connection to this movie or each other) - a parody of Bo Derek's famous beach scene in 10; Father Merrin's eerie arrival in The Exorcist; a riff on Pacino in Scarface; and a dead-on Robert Shaw impression from Jaws. Unfortunately, Carvey's target audience - remember, this is rated G and being heavily advertised on Nickelodeon - seems to be kids ages 6-10 suffering from severe head trauma. I doubt most parents will even get these references. For what it's worth, the movie also features the most inept Star Wars spoof ever committed to celluloid.
Not surprisingly, Disguise is being uniformly panned. A look at "Rotten Tomatoes" shows that out of 22 reviews, not a single one is positive. The NY Times' Elvis Mitchell criticizes Carvey for his lack of edge, "There's honor in bringing a wild streak to comedies for the whole family, which don't have to be an exercise in prudence, like The Master of Disguise." Roger Ebert dubs the movie a "desperate miscalculation," writing, "It gives poor Dana Carvey nothing to do that is really funny, and then expects us to laugh because he acts so goofy all the time. But acting funny is not funny. Acting in a situation that's funny--that's funny." [In Woody Allen's great Crimes and Misdemeanors, Alan Alda's loathsome TV producer explains comedy thusly, "If it bends it's funny; if it breaks, it isn't funny." Note to all you writers out there: A Google search shows that this quote has been referenced so many times in so many articles, whether movie related or not, that you're not being clever if you borrow it.] Finally, Reel's Tor Thorsen calls Disguise, "A comedic train wreck that could very well make Carvey the next Joe Piscopo."
In 1988 or '89 I had the pleasure of seeing Carvey, arguably at the height of his SNL fame, do stand-up at the Civic Center in Des Moines, IA. A rising star named Mike Myers was the opening act. They joined each other on stage at the end to do "Wayne's World," which was popular on SNL but hadn't yet been made into a hit movie. I can honestly say it was the funniest two hours of my life. Carvey can't make even a halfway funny movie, but I suppose he can take solace in the fact that nobody has ever uttered those words and "Joe Piscopo" in the same sentence.
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