Elvis Has Left the Building
Elvis Has Left the Building
| 27 August 2004 (USA)
Elvis Has Left the Building Trailers

Harmony had an encounter early in life with the young Elvis, and can't seem to shake his influence. Now a Pink Lady selling cosmetics, she seems to inadvertently bring harm to any Elvis impersonators she encounters. After a bizarre car accident leaves a slew of them dead, Harmony goes on the run from the authorities, hooking up with a downtrodden ad exec who has Elvis troubles of his own.

Reviews
TrueHello

Fun premise, good actors, bad writing. This film seemed to have potential at the beginning but it quickly devolves into a trite action film. Ultimately it's very boring.

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Numerootno

A story that's too fascinating to pass by...

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Marva-nova

Amazing worth wacthing. So good. Biased but well made with many good points.

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Zandra

The movie turns out to be a little better than the average. Starting from a romantic formula often seen in the cinema, it ends in the most predictable (and somewhat bland) way.

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MBunge

This film is like a jigsaw puzzle put together with the pieces from 5 different boxes, so nothing fits together and the end result is an awkward mess. Box #1 is a darkly comic take on the Elvis impersonator phenomenon and the pathetic people who take it way too seriously. Box #2 is a plaintive spin on a woman looking for love after a lifetime consumed by her job as a cosmetics saleswoman. The third set of pieces are about that same woman's odd relationship with Elvis Pressley, complete with flashbacks to Elvis-involved moments from her childhood and an internal monologue where she talks to The King like he was her guardian angel. Even more parts of the story revolve around the struggles of an advertising executive trying to do his job with some creative integrity, of all things, and appear to be in the movie solely because Sean Astin, of all people, agreed to take a supporting role. And the fifth concept that got chopped up and ungracefully jammed into Elvis Has Left The Building is two FBI agents straight out of an off Broadway revival of The Odd Couple. Oh, and there's a gay character who would have been a boring stereotype in 1994, let alone a decade later when this thing was made.Harmony Jones (Kim Basinger) is a traveling saleswoman on a tour of the Great American Southwest, trying to recruit other women to start pushing Pink Lady Cosmetics. A childhood encounter with Elvis has left her with a lifelong, emotional bond with the music legend that starts sweet and turns satirical when Harmony starts running into Elvis impersonators as they accidentally kill themselves. That's what brings in two mismatched federal agents (Mike Starr and Phill Lewis) to investigate the death spree. There's also the handsome ad man (John Corbett) on his way to Las Vegas to drop off his soon-to-be-ex-wife's Elvis costume who runs into Harmony and instantly chases after her like a starving dog after a pound of hamburger. The ad man is also constantly on the phone with his assistant in New York (Sean Astin), arguing over how trashy a new campaign should be.Kim Basinger always has a certain appeal and if someone with some talent had been brought in to radically rewrite this horrible script, taking Harmony, John Corbett's character and the whole Elvis motif and excising pretty much everything else, maybe director Joel Zwick could have used that to make a romantic comedy that didn't stink on ice. Elvis Has Left The Building is so inept, I'd bet money that it never occurred to credited writers Mitchell Ganem and Adam-Michael Garber how much the name Harmony Jones sounds like something out of 1970s "blaxploitation" flick. Their plot is dependent on people behaving like morons. They wouldn't know a good joke if it landed on their head like an Acme anvil squashing Wile E. Coyote. At least 50% of the scenes they've written here should have never been shot, forget about left on the cutting room floor.Normally, a bad movie has several bad things about it. Elvis Has Left The Building has only one flaw but this awful script is so terrible that it drags everything else down like cement shoes on a Mafia informant. If you ever wanted evidence that no one in the movie business knows a good screenplay from a bad one, look no further. Not that you should actually watch this fiasco, of course.

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SaintK

Sit back and enjoy this movie! It's an extremely amusing wanna-be-Elvis impersonator movie, with a funny storyline. Note - it is not a chick flick! There's a host of hilarious cameos - get ready to spot them. The duet with the two undercover cops is a classic. The clever twists will keep you going right until the end. Kim Bassinger is gorgeous, as usual. Together with John Corbett, the chemistry between these two works well. The many Elvis impersonators are a hoot but there's no disrespect to the King. If anything, the message is clear - he was the one and the only. Michael W. Kennedy is impressive as the younger Elvis and there's some sweet memories. Music is cleverly intertwined into the plot.

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tkleeman

This movie starts a bit slow, and you have to bear a bit of malice toward Elvis impersonators (who doesn't?), but it is hilarious. Kim Basinger is perfect as the guardian of Elvis's true spirit who unwittingly brings doom to a whole string of bogus Elvis's as she keeps pure the memory of her own childhood encounter with the real thing. And the Elvises all come to such delicious ends. The final mass annihilation of Elvises opens Harmony's eyes and we see finally see the angry Elvis behind all of the misfortune. If you like black humor, don't miss this gem. I only wish they had a found an actor to play the real Elvis who looked more the part...

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reliles

This movie was a delightful surprise. I laughed all the way through it. Although it poked some gentle fun at Elvis impressionists and a number of other things, it left the memory of the King alive and well. I wish I had seen it on the big screen.I enjoyed seeing Kim Basinger in this movie and she was quite funny. She is still looking good.The romance in the movie was a bit predictable, but didn't take away from it at all. You just need to be in the mood to watch something silly and enjoy it for what it is. The cameo appearances by some well known actors added to the film. I had to check the credits to make sure I was seeing who I thought I was seeing in one scene.

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