THREE MEN AND A BABY (1987)

What is it with Christmas and New Year? Terrestial channels seem desperate to get out any well-remembered 80's film with a view to getting people in their late 20's and early 30's stuck in front of the telly finishing off the Minstrels purchased by a grandmother, unable to move due to laziness and a fortnight of gluttony. And this is how I came to be watching Three Men and a Baby on 3rd Jan, desperately trying to prolong my last full day off before going back to work.



I watched this thinking to myself that the modern day equivalent would be a film starring Will Ferrell, Sacha Baron Cohen and Adam Sandler, comedy heavyweights (now I must qualify that Sandler hasn't done anything good in a long while and he is not really to my taste, I include his name just because he is a big name and has box office pull) brought together in one blockbuster film. Then I did a spot of internet research and it became clear that it wasn't the juggernaught I thought it might be, Ted Danson and Tom Selleck (has he aged at all since?) were TV actors (Cheers and Magnum PI respetively - both pleasures for me growing up), all be it very popular ones, and Guttenberg was fresh from Police Academy 1 & 2 and Cocoon. Not exactly the dream team on paper.

Having said that, just because they didn't have a bundle of huge films under their belt, doesn't mean that they weren't any good, and this film certainly proves that the trio had something about them. The story of three bachelors living in a New York penthouse together, being left to look after a baby is a simple comedy set-up getting characters out of their depth and seeing the consequences unfold. The expected set-pieces and foul ups are made funny by Danson, Selleck and Guttenberg with great timing, visual gags and some nice one liners as the three exchange banter between them.

The problem with the film is that the makers (the one and only Leonard 'Spock' Nimoy behind the camera after a couple of Trek films) didn't have the confidence in the central idea to last a whole film. Instead they shoehorn in a stupid sub-plot about a drug deal that creates a botched action (ish) scene in the middle of the film, completley out of place with the rest of the piece. Then once that is resolved, we are back to the baby plot, with a well played-out and touching finale as they have to give the baby back to it's mother. It's like a spam sandwich made with exquisite focaccia bread, the vile meat stuffed between to lovely chunks of suculent bread.

It's a real pity that there wasn't enough conviction to concentrate solely on the three characters and the child, because when it's just about that, it's a lovely film, the three stars really shining, both comically and dramtically, with some genuinely funny moments. There is a real desire for everything 80's at the moment and the more I revisit cinematic nuggets from this decade, the more I believe that the films are flawed.....

Now if they're going to remake this one....Larry David, Jerry Seinfeld and Jason Alexander please.

Oh and one more thing, there was an urban legend about this film - was there a ghost behind the curtain....?