SPACE JAM: A NEW LEGACY
Cert U ★ In cinemas now
Twenty-five years after Michael Jordan’s marketing team packed him off to play basketball with the Looney Tunes gang in Space Jam, LA Lakers basketball star Lebron James dribbles through another soulless live action/ animation hybrid.
Laughs are in short supply and there’s no sense of a coherent story after James (playing himself) and his son Dom (Cedric Joe) are sucked into Warner Brothers’ computer servers by rogue artificial intelligence AL-G Rhythm (Don Cheadle).
Before the film can deliver its “be true to yourself” message, we have to sit through a rehashed The Emoji Movie as James makes brief, witless visits to virtual worlds based on Warner Brothers’ most lucrative franchises.
After teaming up with Bugs Bunny to rescue Porky Pig, Foghorn Leghorn and friends out of Metropolis and Mad Max, an interminable “powered-up version” of the American ball game begins.
I just felt sorry for Bugs. The old pro plays on but his five writers fail to deliver a single decent quip.