Innerspace
(1987)
There’s
no doubt that Innerspace is a flawed
movie. Joe Dante finds himself pulling in different directions, his instincts
for comic subversion tempered by the need to play the romance plot straight. He
tacitly acknowledges this on the DVD commentary for the film, where he notes
Pauline Kael’s criticism that he was attempting to make a mainstream movie; and
he was. But, as ever with Dante, it never quite turns out that way. Whereas his
kids’ movies treat their protagonists earnestly, this doesn’t come so naturally
with adults. I’m a bona fide devotee of Innerspace,
but I can’t help but be conscious of its problems. For the most part Dante
papers over the cracks; the movie hits certain keynotes of standard Hollywood
prescription scripting. But his sensibility inevitably suffuses it. That, and
human cartoon Martin Short (an ideal “leading man” for the director) ensure
what is, at first glance just another “Steven
Spielberg Presents” sci-fi/fantasy variant (this time a comedic riff on Fantastic Voyage), continually busts at
the seams, distorting into something all together stranger.
Dante’s
films generally explode into unbridled comic asides at every opportunity, but
it’s perhaps the sheer doggedness of Innerspace’s
attempts to tug on the heartstrings that set it apart. Its metaphors are so
undisguised (Short’s Jack Putter discovers the hero inside himself, Dennis
Quaid’s Tuck Pendleton whizzing around within must open his heart – tellingly,
if he gets sucked into Jack’s it will spell death for him). There’s nothing
subtle about this, and Dante usually wouldn’t be able to avoid ripping the piss
out of this the type of Hollywood earnestness.
Yet
it works. The initial guide for the screenplay was that they were making a Dean
Martin and Jerry Lewis movie. Accordingly, Dante’s hero-in-making is a
hypochondriac dork, trapped working in Safeway. The actual hero is a washed-up pilot whose girlfriend has left him. He
is effectively emasculated, made physically tiny (with a microscopic penis) and
cut off from the outside world (for 90% of the film). So Tuck, injected into
Jack, must teach his unwitting host to be a real man while Jack must give him an
insight into caring and vulnerability.
Jack: But
if I were Tuck, I’d talk about you all the time.
There
are peculiar digressions along the way, which don’t come from Dante but mess
with the head of the “serious” plot. Jack is smitten with Lydia (Meg Ryan),
Tuck’s ex, all part of his hero worship of a “real” man. At one point he asks
Tuck to turn off his monitoring equipment so he can have a moment alone with
her (they kiss). Jack’s fantasy-yearnings are easy to understand, but Tuck’s
compliance? Maybe he’s so confident in his own red-bloodedness that he knows
her snogging the dweeb is no threat. And Lydia’s willingness? Yes, she’s seeing
the man she loves in Jack, but it’s all slightly icky. It turns out okay, of
course, as the act only goes to confirm Tuck’s feelings for Lydia (washed by
saliva into Lydia’s body, he witnesses their unborn child).
Jack: Jack Putter to the rescue!
Kael
is partially correct in here review of the film; the romance doesn’t ring true for Jack, and goes to
undermine his better qualities. It feels like an emotional beat that has been
foisted on him, and Short’s at his least convincing playing to the depths of
feeling (it’s the comedian’s affliction, as anyone witnessing Robin Williams go
all mushy will attest). Jack doesn’t need to turn moon-eyed; if anything, it’s
a move more likely to set the audience against him. Short’s most comfortable
mode is wild exaggeration (his strong dramatic showing in Season Three of Damages not withstanding) and pinning
him down like this doesn’t quite play.
Arguably, we leave Jack Putter with
completely unrealistic expectations of his own abilities; he has moved from the
fantasyland of non-existent illnesses to the fantasyland of pursuing sub-007
spy antics (and, in so doing, he swears off his dodgy date and dead-end job). I
don’t know if this is Dante’s intention, although the absurdity of the
situation cannot have escaped him (Jack facing down pint-sized versions of the
villains might actually be something
he can handle). Perhaps what matters is that Jack believes in himself, no
matter how absurd this is (and we don’t need to worry about him because,
despite the attempts at grounding, he’s a cartoon funny man). However
unrealistic he is, we are asked to join in Jack’s superficially triumphant release
from the ties that bind him (even if it’s to the strains of Rod Stewart’s,
rather than Sam Cooke’s Twistin’ the
Night Away).
The
twisted joke is that Jack is delusional when we meet him and he is delusional
when we leave him, in hot pursuit of the Cowboy. But Short is so likeable, even
in his dopey and ill-conceived infatuation, that he never really loses our sympathy. When he bests the villains they are
unlikely comic triumphs. Dante’s not equipped with a script that allows for a
rigorous deconstruction of the hero mythos, à
la Big Trouble in Little China, but
he does manage to pull his metaphors in directions that don’t completely pay
off (it’s all very well to try and find that heroic self, but if he isn’t you at all?) It can’t really be a paean
to self-empowerment if, come the climax, Jack still really wants to be Tuck
(off he goes in Tuck’s car).
Tuck: Don’t be a wusspuss. Be a man! (Jack slams down his glass on the
table and startles Lydia.)
One
of the key ingredients in Innerspace‘s
is its marriage of unlikely opposites. On the face of it, you couldn’t have two
more unlikely co-leads. Quaid comes from the school of cocky, self-assured ‘80s
leading men (see also Bruce Willis and Kurt Russell). In Quaid’s case, he never
quite made it as a star attraction, but his charisma is undeniable. He’s not
the sort you put in a broad, slapstick comedy. Short is exactly that type, though. Diminutive and with a body as malleable
as Mr. Fantastic, your instincts are against taking him seriously. Yet the two
have a fantastic chemistry, even though they physically spend only two scenes
together (both actors were there for the other on set however, ensuring there
was someone “live” to react against).
Tuck: You know what? We’re going to need a lot more help.
And
perhaps that’s the key. Dante has two movies here, running in parallel. If he
takes miniature Tuck seriously (and he does; Tuck, despite his wisecracks and roguishness,
is very much the straight man in a tin can), he can have as much fun as he
likes with his spy/action movie parody involving Jack. It doesn’t matter too
much if the themes are not fully explored; this is first and foremost a comic
confection, and it’s rightly the aspect that fuels the director. The love story
is a straightforward reconciliation through repentance and there can never be
any doubt as to how it will be resolved. It amounts to little that Jack still
wants to be Tuck, and would no doubt still pursue Lydia in a heartbeat if he
had a serious chance.
Even
given the uncertain emotional territory it covers, Innerspace conforms to the template of many a spy spoof; our
unlikely everyman (Jack Putter – Martin Short) is forced into a world of
espionage through the conspiring of circumstance This is often through mistaken
identity, but in this case, a tiny pilot (Tuck Pendleton – Dennis Quaid) is
injected into his bottom. He must then win out against the odds through a
combination of dumb luck and fortuitous ineptitude. This involves joining
forces with an attractive woman (Lydia) who is way out of his league. He must
also impersonate a bad guy (The Cowboy – Robert Picardo) in order to gain vital
information.
The script, credited to Chip Prosser and Jeffrey Boam (the Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade scribe,
who rewrote Prosser) has some automatic leeway with its science fiction element
because it goes the spoof route. It doesn’t
beg for Fantastic Voyage’s verisimilitude,
even if it must have a certain degree of internal logic to keep the audience on
board. The miniaturisation process involves much spinning and blinding light;
it’s a magician’s trick, basically. So the science is left hanging; are Tuck’s
molecules and those of the ship now tinier? Presumably, so how do they interact
in an unaffected environment (even within a human body)? The writers throw in a
concern about not letting (normal-sized, as opposed to miniature) air into the
pod as the pressure would kill Tuck. But then they allow him to gather regular
sized rum in his hip flask. How does that work? It doesn’t and it’s only when Dante
slows down enough, or is unable to distract you with funnies, that you start to
ask those questions.
There’s also the rare moment where is his instincts desert
him, both comically and dramatically; the half-sized Scrimshaw and Canker
scenes are completely bizarre, I’ll give him that, but they’re too weird to be
as funny as I’m sure they were on paper (particularly the cuts between models
and the actors) and lack the sense of threat needed for a thrilling climax.
Tuck: The
Tuck Pendleton machine: zero defects.
This
is the film where Quaid and Ryan met (they reteamed the following year on the
largely forgotten D.O.A. remake) and
their opening scenes together are all you need to buy into the “meant to be” Tuck
and Lydia relationship. Structurally, the writers are at times quite clumsy in
their foreshadowing of elements. The mention of the facial reconfiguration
device is a particularly glaring one (what’s Tuck going to use it for in a
rabbit?) But in the case of their relationship they do a remarkably good, if
not to say tidy, job. Sam Cooke’s Cupid,
which appears to have an effect on Lydia not unlike Rohypnol, is later reused
at a crucial moment to inform her that tiny Tuck is inside her. As she climbs
into her taxi to leave him, she responds to his suggestion that he’s broken his
toe with “Well, better your toe than your
heart”. Later, in order to convince her that he really is inside Jack, he instructs Putter to tell her,
Tuck: But
it was my heart that was broken and not my toe.
It’s
a moment that manages to be both terribly corny and incredibly sweet, and it
works thanks to the performances. Both actors know they need to play the
relationship real, and resist the urge to overplay (which absolutely everyone
else in the movie is doing); it may be
easier to do that if you’re only acting against yourself, but then again you
have to deal with the fact that you’re only
acting against yourself (Bruce Willis would traverse similar isolated terrain
to Quaid, but to far greater box office, in the following year’s Die Hard).
Quaid’s
‘80s roles were most memorable when they played up his charisma. Blessed (or
cursed) with a Jack Nicholson grin and Harrison Ford delivery (the latter
certainly here), he first made an impression in Breaking Away in 1979. His cachet increased again with ensemble The Right Stuff in 1983, where he played
astronaut Gordon Cooper. From there until the end of the decade he turned up in
a number of would-be hits, none of which made him more than a would-be star.
His name was known, but no one was especially interested in his movies (and then
a slowly dawning full stop was reached with the failure of Great Balls of Fire!) It’s a shame. Quaid’s given strong
performances in an array of films since, but few have drawn on his natural
charm (Doc Holliday in Wyatt Earp is
a notable exception, but even there he was eclipsed by Val Kilmer’s version of
that character in Tombstone). As
such, Innerspace might be the best
example of his brio given full vent.
Jack: She
deserves better.
Ryan
had been noticed the year before in Top
Gun. Three years later she would achieve fully-fledged leading lady status with
When Harry Met Sally and maintained
that for another decade. Here she’s somewhere in between; it’s the girlfriend
part, but a pro-active girlfriend part. Audiences may not have flocked to the
film, but it further cemented her as destined for great things and announced
her as a natural comedienne (something increasingly allowed to slip as her
career chundered on). When Jack wistfully comments on her “cutest little overbite” and “adorable
pouty expression” you can be sure Short improvised what everyone was
thinking (ad-libs were the order of the day on set).
Ryan’s a delight in every scene, particularly
playing opposite Picardo’s Cowboy, and even convinces you that Jack’s kiss
rocked her world (or at least gave her a moment of reverie). She also looks
great in a leather skirt. In recent years Ryan has unwisely started messing
about with her face, so you could do worse than check her out here, on the cusp
of stardom, and be reminded what all the fuss was about.
Dr. Greenbush: Uh, good news Jack! I think we can rule out demonic possession right
off the bat.
This
was also the time of Martin Short’s break into movies. He found fame with the
Second City comedy troupe (in particular portraying super nerd Ed Grimley)
before John Landis snapped him up for the fitfully hilarious Three Amigos, the year before Innerspace. Dante’s film is something of
a rare leading man role for Short; he’s generally been best remembered for high
impact cameos (Father of the Bride,
for instance).
Dante recalls that the performer’s approach is one of developing
a scene through as many takes as possible, such that the Short’s first would be
very different to his tenth. Innerspace,
as early in his career as it is, may still stand as the best example of his
versatility. He’s given the headroom to mine the comedic potential from each
scene, but he’s also required to make Jack a fully formed character (much rarer
when he’s doing a supporting “bit”). I’ve discussed the more disturbed aspects
of Jack’s transformation, but it’s his comic timing that leaves the strongest
impression.
Dr. Greenbush: The most important thing for you right now
is no excitement.
We’re
first introduced to Jack at one of his regular visits to Dr. Greenbush (William
Schallert, who also played The Incredible
Shrinking Man’s GP). Short ensures this quickly devolves in a clumsy klutz
routine where everything goes wrong. His second visit is a master class in rapport
with the scene’s co-players (two of Short’s Second City alumni). Jack, hearing
voices (Tuck trying to communicate with him), starts to worry his fellow
waiting room waiters.
Jack: Did you
hear that?
Waiting Room Patient: Hear what?
Jack: You
didn't hear that then?
Waiting Room Patient: Noooo, I'm sorry, I didn't hear anything. Are you feeling all right?
Jack: Would
I BE in a DOCTOR'S OFFICE if I WAS feeling all right?
It
comes as no surprise that Joe Flaherty and Andrea Martin had worked with Short
before, as the timing between the three is a delight. It culminates in one of
the movie’s best-known lines, “Oh God,
somebody help me. I’m POSSESSED!”
Rep: How about a little shipboard romance?
Jack: Well, as long as it isn’t too exciting.
There
premise yields a rich vein of comic misunderstandings and miscommunications; at
most points one character is oblivious to something crucial that another does know. This may take the form of a
quick set-up (Jack, in a lift, hears Tuck talking to him and looks to the his
fellow passenger):
Tuck: Hello.
Hello, can you hear me?
Jack: (Looks at man): Who me?
Or
it may contrast between what one person can’t hear and another can. When Jack
visits the lab, Tuck’s old colleague Pete (Harold Sylvester) is there (not his favourite
person). Pete promises to get Tuck out of Jack. And of course, Jack must
intermediate the conversation.
Tuck: You better, you two-faced son-of-a-bitch.
Jack: Tuck says, “Thank you”.
The
biggest laugh in the movie (certainly on first viewing) must be the urinal scene.
Jack goes for a leak, during which he talks to Tuck about the latter’s shrunken
state. The one-sided conversation is listened to by an increasingly disturbed
Kenneth Tobey.
Jack: What’s so bad about being small? You’re not going to be small forever.
Man: Play with it pal, but don’t talk to it.
Elsewhere,
Dante builds the comedy into something more sustained. The scene at the Safeway
checkout, where Kathleen Freeman’s goods tally to an unbelievable price
($128,000) has been set up by Jack’s first doctor’s call. He recounts a
nightmare featuring the same woman and the same situation, ending with her
drawing a gun on him. The same sequence plays out here (there is no pouring of
cold water on the veracity of premonitions although perhaps this should be no
surprise, following in the wake of Explorers’
lucid dreaming).
Woman: Say, that’s kind of pricey for shampoo isn’t
it?
Mr. Wormwood: What have you done Jack? What have you done?
Jack: It’s a dream.
Mr. Wormwoood: What?
Jack: It’s a dream.
Wendy: God, Jack! Way to screw up!
Again,
the timing of the actors and the editing of the sequence are nigh on perfect.
The aghast expressions of Wendy (Wendy Schaal) and Mr. Wormwood (Henry Gibson)
to the haywire till (caused by Tuck’s activities) and then to Jack’s panic
attack are just as amusing as Short’s antics (he cracks open a bottle of
aspirin and pours them into his mouth, hyperventilating). Witness Gibson’s
stunned “Oh my God. He’s completely
spaced out”.
Woman: Hey, I’m not buying that aspirin now.
Man: At $800 dollars a bottle, who’d want to?
Every
beat is perfection. Dante has the eye of cartoonist, and stuffs each frame with
minutiae and asides, ensuring sequences are fresh each time you watch them. For
example, Chuck Jones’ appearance above as the $800 dollar bottle man. There
line itself is very funny, and perfectly deadpan, and then, for those in the
know, there’s the realisation of who is saying it.
At
other times, the comic value is just a case of Short showing off his physical
dexterity. Getting angry at Tuck, he attempts to beat the pilot out of himself.
Jack: (hitting himself) Where are you, you little weasel?
The
meat truck chase, where Jack clings to the truck’s rear door before being
spread between it Tuck’s sports car is both thrilling and hilarious (and
impressive for the parts Short was clearly doing himself). Then there are his
ad-libbed attempts to distract himself from Tuck by watching TV. Later, his
drunken dancing to Twistin’ the Night
Away is indulgent but impressively unhinged.
At
other times still, it’s not what he does but what he says. His queasy response
to the advance of a would-be assassin (“Hello,
Mr. Killer”), on realising that he doesn’t have Tuck super-strength to aid
him (be this through pep-talks or the stroking of his adrenal gland), is
priceless.
But
one of the essential attractions of Dante’s films is the supporting cast, many
of whom are regulars. Indeed, often the greatest pleasure is seeing how he was
woven his idiosyncratically chosen players into his latest feature, and how
they have been given freedom to explore. I’m not trying to do Short down, as
he’s driving the film, but the guest turns are at least as funny. And, in one
case, the actor steals the movie from under him when he spends a good 10
minutes playing Jack Putter.
That
actor is the great Robert Picardo, now best known as the holographic Doctor in
the mostly tepid Star Trek: Voyager.
He first worked with Dante playing psycho werewolf Eddie Quist in The Howling and has appeared in much of
the director’s work since. He plays the Cowboy, a fence who deals in stolen
technology (“Who do you think introduced Velcro to the
Persian Gulf?”)
The
Cowboy is my favourite Picardo/Dante part; to the extent that, when he’s
knocked out/Jack reverts back to Short, the film never quite recovers from the hole
he leaves (not even knowing that we see him again during the last scene makes
up for disappearance).
The Cowboy: Women love me. But you know that. But for serious, two things you want
to know about me. One, I make love with my boots on. And two…
Unsurprisingly,
Picardo improvised many of his lines. Only in a Joe Dante film could you expect
an extended sequence where Robert Picardo pretend-lassoes Meg Ryan at a
nightclub, then engages in his special brand of wooing. (One of the reasons the
scene works so well is the music. In particular, Narada Michael Walden’s Is It really Love? exudes the kind of
excessive ‘80s synth pop that is still catchy; combined with Picardo’s insane
moves it takes on a demented majesty.)
The Cowboy: Howdy, big Jack.
And
Picardo is so winningly unselfconscious that he’s willing to stand in leopard
skin briefs, cowboy boots and hat, prematurely popping a champagne bottle when
Jack enters (“Big Jack! Don’t knock, just come”). The Cowboy’s an exuberant caricature of the self-regarding macho man, stubbing out cigars on his palm and
unselfconsciously singing I’m an Old
Cowhand (From the Rio Grande) – “Yippee-ayo-hi-yay”.
Lydia: How
did you get Jack’s hair?
But
then something very Mission: Impossible
happens; Picardo is allowed to assume the mantle of leading man for a
significant chunk of the story (and how often does a movie pull that one; most
lead actors’ egos wouldn’t countenance such a thing). That facial
transformation software mentioned right at the start? That’s why it’s mentioned,
folks.
Some
of Picardo’s ad-libbing is lunatic (why doesn’t he know how he got Jack’s hair?
He is Jack!) and it feeds into the
movie’s best scene. (Dante certainly thinks so, and I agree with him.) Picardo,
playing Jack playing the Cowboy, meets with Victor Eugene Scrimshaw (another
Dante regular, Kevin McCarthy) to take possession of the chip stolen from
Vectorscope at the beginning of the movie (it is required convert Tuck back to
normal size). The scene is another lesson in comedy perfection as Lydia and
Jack attempt to bluff their way through the proceedings.
Scrimshaw: Don’t
you remember? Idi Amin’s barbecue?
Jack: Oh
yes how could I forgot! The sauce!
Picardo’s
distracted playing with his food (“Fine I
take what you got”), clumsiness with the chip and attempt to explain his
change of hair (“Outlaw Yosey Wales –
what a flick!”) are sublime. And then they’re topped by the insane
reversion to Martin Short. Rob Bottin’s prosthetics, combined with the stunned disgust
of McCarthy and Fiona Lewis (as Dr. Margaret Canker), show that special effects
can be very, very funny (if you know how to use them).
But all
the major supporting players deserve a mention. Invasion of the Body Snatchers veteran McCarthy had to screen test
for Scrimshaw, at Spielberg’s behest (the producer thought a bigger name was
appropriate). His gleeful villainy is just one of the movie’s many delights, as
he blusters dismissive putdowns (aimed at Jack: “Get back in here you Safeway clerk!”, “Putter, don't be a Putz!”; directed at an unfortunate henchman: “The man's a high school graduate! The green
button, you fool!”) and reduces the plot intrigues to banal capitalism.
Scrimshaw: Nuclear weapons, Jack. They mean nothing. Everybody's got them, nobody
has the balls to use them. Am I right? (Jack shrugs) Space, you say? Space is a flop. Didn't you know that? (Jack shakes
his head) An endless junkyard of orbiting
debris. Ah, but - miniaturization, Jack. That's the ticket. That's the edge
everyone is looking for. Who will have that edge, Jack? Which country will
control miniaturization? (puffs cigar) Frankly,
I don't give a shit. I'm just in this for the money.
Scrimshaw
may be the ultimate Dante villain, a Looney
Tunes Bond baddie. He takes phone
calls in the pink-hued corner of an otherwise empty floor of an office complex,
and takes undiluted pleasure in thinking up the worst possible end for the
hero.
Scrimshaw: Why chance that? Once he's gotten control of the pod and takes the
chip, let's re-enlarge.
Dr. Canker: While it's still inside Mr. Putter?
Scrimshaw: Why not?
Dr. Canker: Have
you any idea what kind of mess that would make?
Then
there’s his half-heard droning monologue as he shares the back of the meat
truck with Jack. We are supposed to be concentrating on the pep talk Tuck is
giving Putter, but can’t help but be distracted by Scrimshaw (here’s what I
could hear):
Scrimshaw: You
know Jack, siting here, freezing as we are, I’m reminded of the year that I
spent working in the great gold fields of Alaska… I was a young man then
myself… those were remarkable nights, hunting for the moose, and the caribou… I
learnt the ways of the Eskimo and the Aleuts. Not a pretty people, Jack…
Henry
Gibson exudes weary resignation as Mr. Wormwood, pressurised Safeway manager
and Jack’s boss (“You know it’s coupon
day”). Gibson found recognition in a couple of Robert Altman films during
the ‘70s (Nashville, The Long Goodbye). John Landis, who’d
cast the actor in The Blues Brothers,
suggested him to Dante. His largest Dante role is as Dr. Werner Klopek in The ‘burbs (again, the director
mischievously casts the most unlikely villains). Here he’s most required to
provide concerned responses to Jack’s behaviour, but Dante picks his casts so
well that you want more than a few minutes of screen time with these characters;
an equally engaging movie could be fashioned out of any one of their skewed
lives (see below).
Mr. Wormwood: Jack, you’ve always been like a son to me.
Well, a nephew anyway. And you've got a great future in
front of you in Retail Food marketing. And I’d just hate to see you throw it
all away by going psycho on us.
Wendy
Schaal, as Jack’s co-employee Wendy (the role was written with her in mind) is
another Dante regular (and equally memorable in The ‘burbs as Bruce Dern’s wife). Her shallow, slightly slutty,
perma-gum-chewing checkout girl is a constant joy. To the extent that,
whatever Jack’s legitimate reasons for not going there (his continued obsession
with Lydia not being one of them), I always rather hoped he’d end up with her.
Wendy: This
is SO exciting. How long have you been leading this double life?
She
takes superficiality to transcendent levels, and her coarseness and
self-centredness in the face of Jack’s problems provide yet more scene stealing
from the supporting cast. I’ve said that Quaid is the straight man to Short,
but often Short becomes the straight man to his co-players by virtue of their
reactions to his actions.
Jack: It
was like someone had just shoved a white-hot sewing needle through the pupil of
my eye.
Wendy: Oh
– GOD!
And
her unbowed rebound from Jack’s rejection in the final scene, as she catches
Dr. Greenbush’s eye contains enough potential for its own spin-off movie.
Dr. Greenbush: Jack, you seem to be experiencing some sort
of theistic hysteria.
Jack: Oh, how do you treat that?
Dr. Greenbush: Well
the medieval remedy was to flay the skin off your body with brands of fire. I
‘ve no idea what the current thinking is.
I
mentioned Schallert’s Dr. Greenbush earlier, and this is another case where you
can almost hear Dante’s glee as he contrasts the actor’s soothing bedside
manner with the content of what he is saying.
Tuck: We're
gonna drink this one to Ozzie. A good man who tried to save my ass by injecting
me into yours.
Fiona
Lewis’ nefarious nymphomaniac doctor wins the prize for best-named villain
(only topped by Christopher Lee’s Dr. Catheter in Gremlins 2). Lewis pretty much gave up acting to concentrate on her
writing career (this is her last credit on imdb
until some recent voice work). She has a great scene early on, when her team
raids Vectorscope. She encounters opposite John Hora’s Ozzie Wexler, head of
the lab, and the exchange is pregnant with implied past history. Hora was
Dante’s regular DP (Andrew Laszlo was used for this movie), and was suggested
for the part by Spielberg. Dante was initially dubious, but it proved to be one
of his producer’s better ideas; Hora brings a natural absent-minded professor
quality to the part. He also contributes an amusing succession of improvs, as
many of his lab asides were unscripted:
Ozzie: These things should have been on my desk a
week ago. Do you have any other pages you haven’t handed in?
Ozzie’s
death scene is typically irreverent; as he lies on the floor of the mall,
fading in and out of consciousness, he is surrounded by the costumed animal
faces gazing down at him.
Mad Max 2 veteran Vernon Wells
appears as Mr. Igor, a limb-deficient heavy with multi-attachment arms (a gun
in the finger, propane blow torch). Dick Miller makes his usual cameo, this
time as the unsubtle cabbie who picks up Ryan (Lydia: I don’t live here.
Taxi Driver: Oh, one nighter).
Dante
films are a repeat viewing treat for the minor details, with bountiful asides
and in-jokes. There’s the complainant at the supermarket who shoves a chicken
under Wormwood’s nose (“Smell it. Well go
on, smell it”). The messenger/hit man who returns the videotape that flew
threw Jack’s window minutes before (“This
yours?”). Jack’s response to the “Eat me, drink me” computer password (“What is that? From The Exorcist?”) And
Wormwood at the wedding, bemoaning the fate of some of Safeway’s wares (“It’s true Jack. The whole shipment, it had
worms”).
Besides
his cameo, Chuck Jones and Looney Tunes
are ever-present. Bugs Bunny is the main player in Innerspace; the rabbit subject is named after him, and he appears
in the form of various toys placed around Tuck’s apartment (“Now take it easy”). A Mel Blanc hiccup is heard
when Jack is drunk and the spinning pod makes the sound of the Tasmanian Devil.
Jerry
Goldsmith’s score is one of his richest, including a memorable love theme for
Tuck and Lydia, the wonderfully complementary cowboy theme and the electronic
jangle of Mr. Igo. There’s also the opening macro shot, pulling out from a
glass of what is revealed to be ice, imbued with the glinting awe of a journey
through the cosmos. Unlike many ‘80s movies, where the song choices now affront
the ears, the selected tracks fit seamlessly (even though none of them – the
Sam Cooke songs aside – are classics or hits).
Production
designer James H. Spencer furnishes the Vectorscope lab with a charmingly lo-fi
quality, contrasting with the cash-rich villain’s lair. A much-deserved Oscar
was awarded for the visual effects. Dante suggests that the car forced-perspective
work, with the half-sized Scrimshaw and Canker, attracted voters; I find this a
little unlikely, as it’s the only effects sequence in the film that falls short.
The interior effects are awe-inspiring and frequently quite beautiful; understandably,
the ick-factor of the body is eschewed for the most part. An exception is Jack’s
erupting ulcer, which consumes the miniaturised Mr. Igo and his submersible
(making Jack an unwitting cannibal).
Produced in the pre-CGI age, not only do
the visual effects stand the test of time but any future attempt to make a mini-movie is
doomed to unflattering comparisons. It will undoubtedly fail to match up
because the process will be entirely non-practical. Dennis Muren’s explanations
of the process leave you baffled at just how dazzling the visuals are; everything
he says they did to realise them sounds so much less impressive than what you
see on screen.
Dante
intended Innerspace to be a bounce
back from the flop that was Explorers.
It’s probably no coincidence that it remains his only movie with fully-fledged
adult love story. You could quite see that, in a journeyman director’s hands,
this would have ended up as a much more straightforward adventure comedy (for
example, helmed by Joe Johnston or Ron Howard). Anything the director embraces
ultimately morphs into something that mirrors his skewed view.
But,
as he tells it, the problem was not that audiences rejected the film; they just
weren’t aware of it. Preview screenings provided such a vote of confidence that
Warner Bros felt they didn’t need to spend money on promoting it. Released on
the Independence Day weekend in 1987, it only reached the Number Two spot, and
fell out of the Top 10 three weeks later. With a final gross of $25.9m, almost
every wide release that month grossed more money (Jaws IV and Superman IV proving
notable exceptions). Better received were Revenge
of the Nerds II: Nerds in Paradise, Summer
School and the movie that reached pole position on Innerspace’s first weekend, Adventures
in Babysitting.
In
some respects it’s a surprise that Spielberg gave Dante as many chances as he
did, as his anarchic leanings and subversive wit are as far from the man who
made E.T. as you can imagine. Even
when you hear of the ‘berg’s less-comprehending pronouncements or suggestions
(while wearing his producer’s baseball cap) you have to conclude he meant well
and that he genuinely liked at least parts of what Dante was doing. Why else
would he have been invited back to the fold (after a six-year big screen
absence) for the fledgling DreamWorks’ Small
Soldiers?
I
wasn’t aware of the disappointing business the film did at the time. I recall
some lukewarm reviews, but it seemed like another sure thing blockbuster movie.
It was the latest in a line that included Back
to the Future and Gremlins; it
had Steven Spielberg’s name attached! Like the even bigger flop Big Trouble in Little China, it quickly
became a video favourite; a testament to longevity having little to do with the
fleeting gratification of instant dollar profit. All Dante’s movies have an enduring
shelf life, if only by virtue of no one else making anything like them. Innerspace is probably the most
identifiably ‘80s of his most successful decade (creatively and for sheer number
of directing gigs, that is) but it hasn’t really dated. Neither has it garnered
the wider respect it deserves. It seems to be the fate of Dante, as a film buff
and lover of cult movies, to be feted as a cult movie director, one who brushed
with mainstream status but found it never quite took. Innerspace is a testament to that; his attempt to chase a hit
mutated into a movie as peculiar as any in his oeuvre.
At the top of the page is the poster I'm most used to (it was also the video cover), but here's a selection of variable alternatives:
Ouch. Would you want to see this movie?
Not terrible or anything, but it doesn't scream excitement, thrills, laughs a-plenty.
What's Short doing in a shopping trolley? Why's Meg cheerfully shooting people? Who knew this starred Ryan O'Neal?
Now that's more like it.