REVIEW ON RAT RACE
Two million dollars plus five hundred miles plus six random contestants equals big fun for everyone. That is the formula for Rat Race, the new screwball comedy from the maestro of slapstick, Jerry Zucker (Airplane!, Naked Gun), and former SNL scribe Andy Breckman. Combining America's current obsession with reality-based programming with heavy doses of comedy and movie magic, Zucker and Breckman have created what will be the best end-of-summer movie in theatres this weekend, so long as you're willing to kick back, check your brains, and enjoy it for everything it's worth.
The plot is as simple as can be a Vegas casino owner (John Cleese) rounds up a bunch of random contestants to participate in a five-hundred-mile race, starting in Las Vegas and culminating at a train station in Silver Spring, New Mexico. The reward? Two million bucks, stashed in a duffel bag in a locker at the train station. The rules? Absolutely none.
John Cleese sets these contestants off on their race for the $2 million jackpot so that his fellow millionaires can bet even more money on the race itself, "a horse race with animals that can think, plan, and cheat!"
I can honestly say that I haven't laughed as hard during a movie all year as I did during Rat Race. In none of the multitude of comedies that have marched their way through theatres this year are the elements of physical comedy, burlesque humor, and gross-out sight gags as fully and appropriately utilized as they are in this film. There were knee-slapping and side-splitting moments so genuinely hilarious that, on more than one occasion, tears sprung from my eyes.
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