Masterful Movie

It's fun, it's light, [but] it has a hard time when its tries to get heavy.

The movie really just wants to entertain people.

Mostly, the movie is committed to the value of a good time.

Continuing my plan to watch every Eddie Murphy movie in order, I come to Best Defence (1984)Plot In A Paragraph: A military weapons engineer struggles to do his job responsibly, while a tank commander has to live with the consequences in combat two years later.This is a real Mis step for Murphy and it's seriously unfunny!! Although both integral to the plot, Dudley Moore and Eddie Murphy never appear in the same scene. Murphy's (Billed as a Strategic Guest Star) character was added to the film after the original version tested disastrously with audiences. When asked about it Eddie Murphy replied I said "What?! How dare you give me a script like this! Oh, THAT much money? Let's go!" Murphy has also said, "How did I get involved? The door opened, and four men came in carrying a check, that was more than I was paid for 48 Hrs. and Trading Places combined."Murphy's scenes are set two years after Moore's but the two stories are intercut (long before it became fashionable to show movies out of order) so the Murphy scenes are littered throughout the movie, instead of all being at the end. One has to wonder how bad this movie was before Murphy's involvement, as he is the best thing in it by far, even though he is not on top form, and is at least watchable. There is one spell (about 30 mins in) where Murphy is not on screen for about half an hour, and I have serious thought to turning it off, as life is just too short!! I persevered with it. Best Defence grossed $19 million at the domestic box office to finish 1984 the 56th highest grossing movie of the year. Luckily for Murphy he had another movie out that in 1984, and the momentum his career had, was not hurt.

In 1982 California, Wylie Cooper (Dudley Moore) is an incompetent engineer building the latest super tank's dyp gyro. He and Laura (Kate Capshaw) have a young son. The company is failing and it's all down to his work. Clair Lewis (Helen Shaver) is his supervisor and Steve Loparino (George Dzundza) is his co-worker. In 1984 Kuwait, Lieutenant T.M. Landry (Eddie Murphy) commands the super tank demonstrating for the local Sheikh. Neither man meets each other but they are undeniably connected.These are two of the more compelling comedic actors of their times. It's a real headscratcher why they aren't acting together in this movie. Instead of Dzundza, there's no reason why they couldn't put in Eddie Murphy in that role. It would be the same screen time. Back in the day, I found this movie functionally average with two comedians I love. Looking at it with modern eyes, there is a bit of cartoon racism everywhere and I don't like Wylie's roaming eyes for his boss. The bumbling international espionage is stupid and a muddled mess. The central flaw of separating these two hot comedic actors is inexcusable. It's the final flaw that drives loving these actors into not liking this movie.

The Dudley Moore / Eddie Murphy debacle. The premise has enough promise, but it never really takes off. The shenanigans in the factory are plain dull. Moore gets to be sarcastic, but not funny, and gets into woman trouble (Helen Shaver and Kate Capshaw are most easy on the eye), but is soon interrupted by a bumbling group of agents who need his help to catch the Rasche character, which leads to some okay consternation in a parking lot. Then there is the whole situation in the Middle-East with Eddie Murphy; I didn't find a single good joke in there. The supposed-to-be-suspenseful (right?) inter-cutting with the other half of the film doesn't work one bit, either.Moore, Murphy, Rasche and other assorted actors may have given it a good go, but without funny jokes and / or an entertaining story, it don't WAMmo, no sir.2 out of 10.

As near as I can tell, some producers attempted to capitalize on Eddie Murphy's (then) new popularity by having him film some scenes to be badly edited into an existing Dudley Moore film. I say this because the two stars never share a scene, and their respective storylines really do play like two completely different and unrelated films. The end result is a film so monstrously bad as to be unwatchable. That Eddie Murphy's career could survive this cow patty of a film shows how funny and appealing a performer he is.