Looney Tunes: Back in Action 2003

[7.4/10] I’m not sure what the ideal Looney Tunes movie should look like. The tunes themselves weren’t intended for feature-length adventures. They were crafted for seven-to-eight minute shorts. They’re more personalities than they are characters, not really built to grow and change or have strong motivations beyond the immediate scenario like you need for a good story. They exist for their antics, to spark off of one another (sometimes literally) and make mischief. It’s hard to know how to stretch that out into a ninety minute feature.

But director Joe Dante and writer Larry Doyle probably find the closest thing to a platonic ideal here -- structure the movie to provide tons of excuses to unleash those antics at every opportunity. The truth is that you could watch Looney Tunes: Back in Action in seven minute chunks and not miss much. Theoretically there’s a story, of wannabe stuntmen and studio executives teaming up with cartoon characters to stop a megalomaniacal ACME chairman. That plot, though, is a mere skeleton for Dante and company to build jokes and slapstick and classic Looney Tunes routines onto. And that’s a feature, not a bug.

Back in Action combines globe-trotting spy shtick with the rhythms of a road picture. Both work for the film’s needs. The espionage routine is thin, but provides a rationale to throw Bugs and Daffy onto a variety of different, colorful backdrops. Likewise, it creates a reason for the villain to send multiple “agents” after our heroes.

Those “agents” are not top spooks or imposing figures (save for an oddly silent Bill Goldberg as the heavy), but rather the duck and rabbit’s usual antagonists. The ACME Chairman deploys the likes of Yosemite Sam, Elmer Fudd, Marvin the Martian, Wile E. Coyote, and Taz to bring them down. The results are a series of set pieces where the baddies get their licks in (save for Wile E., of course), but Bugs and company ultimately get the better of them, as is tradition. Most of these set pieces would fit in nicely with the Tunes’ classic capers, with the added verve of translating the usual antagonism into live action.

Hell, about halfway through the film, Fudd chases Bugs and Daffy through a series of famous artwork at The Louvre, and it’s the best bit of cartoon capering there’s been in years. The mix of high and low, the creativity of the gagwork, the expressiveness of the animation all stand up next to the superlative shorts that put the Tunes on the map. If all Back in Action gave us was that one sequence, it would have been worth it.

But there’s more! The road trip/buddy comedy vibes give Bugs and Daffy the chance to trade one-liners, insults, and bon mots with their slightly more strait-laced human counterparts. One of the most enduring formulas in Looney Tunes bits came from the irreverent jokesters taking the stuffing out of the latest irritated stiff. Whether it’s Daffy pestering D.J., the son of an ersatz James Bond actor who wants to follow in his father’s footsteps, or Bugs tweaking Kate, the Warner Bros. VP of Comedy who needs to unfire Daffy to save her job, those old dance steps still have plenty of rhythm to them.

The human characters aren’t bad, either! Brendan Fraser in particular brings the right energy to the film, able to make sense in a cartoony world where he’s neighbors with Sylvester, Tweety, and Granny, while also seeming just human enough for the movie’s silly threats to put him in more peril than the doodles. In the same vein, Joan Cusack’s Q-like mad scientist brings the same just-nutty-enough energy to match goofiness with her toony counterparts.

Unfortunately, the inimitable Steve Martin, who plays the film’s Big Bad, cannot find the same fine-tuned balance. He practically gobbles up the scenery, summoning a character who’s somehow cartoonier than the toons, too over-the-top and prone-to-mugging to fit tonally even in this over-the-top film.

Jenna Elfman lies somewhere in between. She holds her own as a foil to Bugs early in the film, and delivers some funny lines with aplomb. But about halfway through the runtime, the film forgets to do anything with her beyond put her in skimpy costumes and make her a damsel in distress, and she never quite recovers. It’s part and parcel with an unfortunate strain of sexism that runs through the film, in oddly basic ways that go beyond the madcap transgressiveness of the original Looney Tunes shorts.

The good news is, though, beyond some unfortunate artifacts of the time, these versions of the characters still feel like the Looney Tunes. Bugs is calm and quick with a one-liner, apt to wind-up both friend and foe with a sharp wit and a knack for comic reversals. Daffy is perpetually aggrieved and self-aggrandizing, prone to outlandish misfortune and puffing himself up. Their antagonists have short fuses, and often end up subject to piles of dynamite with short fuses. Apart from the challenging tasks of finding a way for these characters to make sense in a feature film rather than a brief romp, Dante and Doyle get the Looney Tunes right, which goes a long way even when the plot feels airy and threadbare at times.

At the same time, Back in Action is enough of a fourth-wall breaking showbiz parody to make fans of the classic shorts proud. The script deploys some amusingly self-referential “updating the brand for a modern age” jokes, familiar but funny material about cartoon logic, and heavy doses of the importance of Bugs’s usual formula. In fact, the closest thing to a real motivation any of the Tunes have is Daffy striving (and achieving) to finally get to be the hero for once. With so many winks at the business of movie-making, the film not only fits nicely into Dante’s oeuvre, but also the Looney Tunes’ constant Hollywood-honking jabs at Tinseltown and their place in it.

Given that inherent backlot-based antagonism and original short form stomping grounds, Bugs, Daffy, and the rest shouldn’t really work when stretched to cinematic length. In truth, even at a crisp hour and half runtime, the film can still feel overlong and overextended after a while. The human characters, outside of Fraser, can come off as mere necessary appendages rather than vital ingredients in this madcap milieu.

And yet, the milieu is good! Bugs and Daffy are appropriately loony, comically resourceful, and amusingly off-the-wall. More to the point, the film offers laughs galore of all shapes and sizes. The spirit of these classic characters is well-realized and willing, even if the format is weak.

There’s no real need for the Looney Tunes to return to the big screen in feature-length form (short of money, dear boy.) But Back in Action is the best translation possible -- a thin yet malleable plot, which leaves plenty of room for the classic-style routines that originally brought the young and young-at-heart to the table. These characters don’t really belong on the silver screen, but then again, making entertaining trouble where they don’t belong is also what they do best. And they’re certainly doing their best here, doc.