Whenever people hear the name Disney, they automatically think of Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, Goofy, Pluto, or any cartoon or movie that is enjoyable for the family. The Walt Disney movies were always filled with innocence and laughter whether it’s full-length animated feature films like “Beauty & the Beast” or “The Lion King” to live action films like “White Fang”. Unfortunately while Disney tries to maintain an image of clean, fun family films and TV programs, the artistry that had made Disney so famous has now declined thanks to formulaic stories and pre-packaged innocence. The past few years for Disney in films have been a time of struggle as the company that made Mickey Mouse so famous made some of the worst movies ever made. Whether it’s the unfunny “Country Bears” or the awful “Snow Dogs” where Disney actually tried to convince people that the no-talent, *ss-clown Michael Bolton has soul. In 2001, Disney went for the jugular with not just one of biggest offenders, but a real artistic low point that immediately died in the box office called “Bubble Boy”.

Now when you hear the name “Bubble Boy”, you automatically think of the 1976 TV movie “The Boy in the Plastic Bubble” starring John Travolta. While I admit, “The Boy in the Plastic Bubble” wasn’t a great movie, it was a movie that had heart and was actually well done since it wasn’t trying to be funny and it was one of first excellent roles Travolta would have before he found a way to screw things up. “The Boy in the Plastic Bubble” was about a young boy, who was born without an immune system, who lived in a plastic bubble to protect him from germs. While it was somewhat a sappy film that didn’t stood its time, it was a good film though. “Bubble Boy” however, wasn’t a good film.

Directed by newcomer Blair Hayes and screenwriters, Ken Daurio and Cinco Paul, “Bubble Boy” was more of a blatant attempt to make “The Boy in the Plastic Bubble” to be an enjoyable family film with low-brow humor. Yet, making fun of someone without an immune system isn’t funny which is why the film drew scathingly bad reviews from critics and moviegoers, particularly parents of children who weren’t born with immunities. While “There’s Something About Mary” made fun of mentally-challenged people, at least the Farrelly Brothers were trying to put some heart into the film while not pushing the line of offending anyone. The creators of “Bubble Boy” weren’t thinking about that when they made the movie since it didn’t just offend un-immune children but it also offended stereotypes, religion, and all sorts of things.

Now “Bubble Boy” overall would’ve sounded like a completely horrible film but in reality, it’s not bad as some say it would seem. What many people overlooked throughout the film was the heartfelt performance from newcomer Jake Gyllenhaal. Prior to this film and his spellbinding performance in “Donnie Darko”, Gyllenhaal was already riding in the acclaim for his performance in 1999’s “October Sky” as he was already part of an established film family. His father Stephen Gyllenhaal (director of films like “Waterland”, “Homegrown”, and “Losing Isiah”) and mother Naomi Foner (the Oscar-nominated screenwriter for “Running on Empty”) were already established creators in film while his older sister; the lovely, enigmatic Maggie was on her way to stardom. Jake Gyllenhaal’s performance as the naïve, good-natured Jimmy Livingston in “Bubble Boy” was the film’s heart and soul but that got overlooked as people paid more attention to the controversy surrounding the movie.

“Bubble Boy” is about this young teen that lives in a bubble as he falls for his next-door neighbor but she decides to get married to another guy. Jimmy decides to create a bubble-suit and ride cross-country to Niagara Falls to profess his love to her while meeting all sorts of freaks and stereotypes while being chased by his own Reagen-nite mother. The film not just relies on lowbrow comedy but goes very far into trying to make it accessible for family films while mostly appealing to teens. Unfortunately, the creators were probably on crack when they made this movie and realized that in the end, it borderlines to the point of political incorrectness. While it has a few funny moments led by the heartfelt performance of Jake Gyllenhaal, Disney reaches its lowest point with one of 2001’s main offenders.

The film begins a long time ago as Jimmy narrates his own young life as he lives in a bubble while being overly protected by his Reagan-obsessed, God-fearing mother (Swoosie Kurtz) who becomes his teacher and tells him all sorts of stuff while giving him non-protein cookies shaped like crosses and stuff. While his father (John Carroll Lynch) wanted to take him to the outside world but Mrs. Livingston refuses as she wants to protect Jimmy from all the bad things in the world. Then as Jimmy becomes a teen with an electric guitar, he is suddenly transfixed by his new next-door neighbor Chloe (Marley Shelton) and as he sees her watches her car and the next day, he gets freaked out by his erection. Chloe wonders about Jimmy as she goes into his house and meets him while he’s starring at her cleavage. Next thing you know, they become pals, much to the dismay of his mother, and then one day on her birthday, she is drunk and she wants to get into his bubble and kiss him but he’s scared about it.

Then one day as she gets ready for the school prom, he meets her rocker-wannabe boyfriend w/ a mullet named Mark (Ryan Sheridan) and as the years passed, she decides to marry Mark because she wanted someone who could hold and Jimmy couldn’t since he’s stuck in a bubble. She leaves for Niagara Falls as Jimmy decides to break out of his bubble room and create a bubble suit and profess his love for Chloe. He escapes and goes nuts over stepping into some dog sh*t and his strange journey begins as his mother just goes nuts that he left. Jimmy stops at a bus stop to wait for a bus to Niagara Falls as he meets up with a strange group of people who are either named Lorraine and Todd as Jimmy learns they’re a fanatical cult. They kick him out until their spiritual leader (played by Fabio) shows them a picture as the cult realizes that Jimmy is their messiah.

Jimmy meanwhile meets up with a biker named Slim (Danny Trejo) who takes him to Las Vegas and tells him not to give up on Chloe, since Slim did give up on a lady named Wildflower. Jimmy goes to Vegas, wins a little speed-bike as Slim, the cult, and Jimmy’s parents look for him. Jimmy then finds a group of circus freak (that includes Howard Stern’s Beetlejuice) as they are led and ridiculed by their leader; a foul-mouthed midget (Verne Troyer aka Mini-Me from the “Austin Powers” movies) as they escape the midget and Jimmy continues his journey. The midget joins up with Jimmy’s parents as Jimmy then meets up with an Indian ice-cream man named Pushpop (Brian George) who goes nuts after he hits a cow and gives Jimmy an ice cream as Jimmy goes wacko over the ice-cream and Pushpop replies, “Oh, everyone loves ice cream”. The journey gets even crazier as Slim is now accompanied by his gang of bikers as they fight off the cult and freaks as Jimmy stops at an Oriental mud-wrestling arena where Jimmy mud wrestles two ladies (one of them is WWE star Stacy Kiebler, by the way, I wondered if Jake got a chance to tap that *ss. I just hope I don’t get him in trouble with Kirsten Dunst, I’ll take the blame where she can beat me up and have his sister finish me off). Jimmy wins $500 as he is accompanied by an old guy named Pappy (Patrick Crenshaw) but he dies, almost, on their way to Niagara Falls.

Jimmy starts to give up hope after a call to Chloe’s cell phone that was answered by Mark as his parents find him before his father gave him one more pep talk to go after Chloe and then the next thing you know, Jimmy meets Pappy’s twin brother Pippy and finally makes it Niagara Falls and finds Chloe and I think everyone knows what happens in the end, considering it’s a Disney film.

Jake Gyllenhaal’s performance in the movie was practically, the only good thing that came out of it. He brings out the sweet, naïve, and funny Jimmy Livingston to life, as it is the film’s most worthwhile moment since the Jimmy Livingston character is the heart of the movie. The rest of the performances however were either badly written or weren’t just good to begin with, notably Marley Shelton’s performance as the sweet but dumb Chloe. Now Shelton has always played a funny, sexy blonde in her films but in “Bubble Boy”, she doesn’t bring anything new and her character is just a dumb*ss who doesn’t know anything. Swoosie Kurtz’s role as Jimmy’s mother was badly written because the screenwriters try to humanize her but she ends up being this paranoid mother who is complete denial about the world. Even the role of Jimmy’s dad by John Carroll Lynch isn’t well written since all he does in the movie is just sit around, drive, and not talk much.

While Danny Trejo is always an enjoyable, bad-*ss Latino, he finally shows a bit of his sensitive side as Slim which is good to watch, particularly since Trejo is finally displaying more ranges as an actor following his excellent role in “Spy Kids”. The rest of the cast is pretty forgettable throughout the whole movie and Verne Troyer as the foul-mouthed midget isn’t very funny but just plain silly. Then there’s some of the lowbrow comedy tone of the film, while with Gyllenhaal who provides some of the best funny moments, the rest of the film isn’t funny since it always is filled with insulting stereotypes and horrible jabs at religion. The mud-wrestling scene with these loud group of Orientals is pretty insulting since I don’t think Orientals would scream “$500” very often like maniacs or the Pushpop character, whose character is often trying to convince everyone about curry, wouldn’t go that far into pushing the spice or place flowers on a dead cow, which will insult Hindus. The cult story is extremely dumb to begin with and the idea of Fabio as their spiritual leader is already bad enough to know that this movie sucks.

Upon the film’s release, it got panned very badly by the critics and several moviegoers and it ended up bombing in the box office and made the list of 2001’s worst films somewhere near “Glitter” and “Freddy Got Fingered”. When it was promoted, the Disney camp tried to convince people it’s a good comedy but it wasn’t. Even Jake Gyllenhaal tried to show the film’s good-natured approach, although half-heartedly. In the end, “Bubble Boy” just disappeared and some were ready to dismiss Jake Gyllenhaal until “Donnie Darko” came out. I think in retrospect, Gyllenhaal only did the movie not to just get some attention but some money. It’s not his fault the film sucked; besides, you can’t come out with a good movie every once in a while. He did it again with “Highway” starring rock-star wannabe Jared Leto while his sister Maggie appeared in a couple of bad movies herself. If Jake admits that he did “Bubble Boy” for the money, then I won’t hold it against him, he just needed work.

While Jake Gyllenhaal’s performance, Danny Trejo, and a few funny moments are the only thing worth watching, “Bubble Boy” is still an overall disaster marking another low point from Disney. It’s very obvious that Disney should stay away from live-action films for a while since it lacks any sense of artistic quality while they have achieved some groundbreaking results with their recent computer-animated hit “Finding Nemo”. In the end, I just watch “Bubble Boy” for Jake Gyllenhaal’s performance and that’s it. While it is a bad film, it is amazing that this is the same young man who captivated audiences in the troubled, schizophrenic “Donnie Darko” is also the naïve, good-natured kid in a bubble.

Donnie Darko (2001):

http://www.epinions.com/content_102579146372



Recommended:
No

Viewing Format: DVD
Video Occasion: Better than Watching TV
Suitability For Children: Suitable for Children Age 13 and Older