Eddie Murphy, it’s been a long time: he had a big hollow in his career after having reigned over the American comedy of the 90’s with films like The Beverly Hills flick, Nutty Professor, or 48 hours.
Focus on A Prince in New York 2, the film of the moment deciphered in on 8/9 by our Madame cinema Cathy Immelen.
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Eddie Murphy, the return of a cult actor!
Eddy Murphy is back with the release on Amazon prime of A Prince in New York 2, the continuation of Prince in New York released in 1988, one of the biggest successes of the entire career ofEddie Murphy !
Little reminder from the history of A prince in New York, the first one released 33 years ago.
Eddy Murphy embodies the prince Akeem of the imaginary African kingdom: le Zamunda. He has just turned 21 and must therefore to marry. An arranged marriage as is customary but he wants to marry for love… so he escapes to the United States and settles in New York! He doesn’t choose just any neighborhood, he takes a map and tells himself that for a future king, you have to go to the Queensexcept that he doesn’t know it’s a pretty Craignos neighborhood. There, he pretends he is poor so that he can find a woman who is truly drawn to him and not to his wealth and power.
” I saw the film again, I find that he has not aged badly at all! There is a nice balanced mix between assumed schoolboy comedy and romantic comedy “complete Cathy Immelen.
In 88, the film is ranked number 3 at the annual box office in the United States!
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It’s also like nothing an important film in the history of the representation of African Americans in the cinema because there are almost, with a few very small roles, only black actors in the casting, without the fact of being black being the center of the story, no cliché on racism and Afro-African communities. American!
For a mainstream comedy at the time, this is an exception!
The first thatEddie Murphy is going to do something that will become one of its hallmarks: “ he embodies several different characters in addition to the main character: the soul singer Randy Watson, Saul (the white Jewish client of the barber-hairdresser) and finally Clarence, barbershop owner ” reminds our columnist.
He did the same in A vampire in Brooklyn, in Norbit but especially in The Nutty professor in 96 with a memorable meal scene where he plays the whole family: the granny, the parents, the old uncle…. All gathered at the table to eat and have as much gas as possible for those who remember the scene…
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A prince in New York 2: a lazy film as a humor
A film which was due to hit theaters in December but which ultimately landed on Amazon prime and last weekend, the film broke streaming records as the most watched movie in a single weekend, since the start of the pandemic!
The story of this issue 2 : Prince Akeem is a dad, he has 3 beautiful young daughters that he raises in the kingdom of Zamunda He is about to become the new king of but he discovers that he has a son, conceived 33 years before during his little getaway in Queens in New York. ” As the girls do not have access to the throne, he will try to find and bring back the heir to the throne! ” adds the Madame Cinéma du 8/9.
Most of the story takes place in Africa and so it’s the inverted mirror of the first: here it is a young New Yorker who is out of step with life in an African royal palace.
But there is a big problem for French speakers who will discover it dubbed in French: ” We all have in mind the French voice of Eddie Murphy doubled by With Hondo, this voice actor died, we are therefore entitled to a new voice, that of Christophe Peyroux…” .
” When we grew up watching Eddie Murphy’s films on TV or on VHS tapes over and over, there is nothing to do, it’s not the same thing … and that, already, that gave me a first problem with the film! “
The film itself does not come close to the first one, it’s really sluggish and lazy as humor, every 20 minutes we have the right to a genre scene musical comedy to fill the void and pass next toa speech that could have been more modern, more progressive on the access of women to the throne.
” In addition it accumulates clichés the most hackneyed on Africa ! whereas the first film rather mocked the American dream… ” Hopefully Eddie Murphy will regain some of its splendor in The Flic of Beverly Hills 4, project announced in 2019 still being written announced and which should be directed by the Flemish duo Adil El Arbi and Bilall Fallah, already authors of the return of Bad Boys for Life with Will Smith and Martin Lawrence “concludes Cathy Immelen.
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