Norbit (2007) 1/2

Hey! You want to know why Eddie Murphy didn't win an Oscar for Dreamgirls? This is it.

I've learned not to expect much out of Eddie Murphy. Has he actually done a good movie in awhile? I can't remember. What makes Norbit so special? Why is Norbit accepted as such a horrible film across the globe? I couldn't figure it out. It bothered me, it tore at my soul. So I had to find out for myself. And within the first few minutes I had my answer. The film also stars... drum roll please.... Cuba Gooding, Jr. That's right, the guy that won the Oscar and then let his career swim in a sewage treatment plant is in Norbit. It's not Eddie Murphy! It's Cuba!

The film has Eddie Murphy playing Norbit, his rotund wife and probably some other characters that I didn't care about. It was cool twenty years ago Akeem, but that stuff got old and we get enough of that in Mike Meyer's movies. The orphanage plot is horrid with acting that isn't really acting but trying to keep up with Mr. Eddie's ad-libbing. The film centers on saving an orphanage. No, Norbit isn't on a mission from God, he's playing a foil to his large wife and her criminal family, who are the ones that want the orphanage for other investment gains. Of course there's the cute girl (Thandie Newton) that got away, who- that's right- is there to save the orphanage because in the movies only good looking people are good and people that look like me are evil.

I have to say once again that the fact that Eddie Murphy is in this should have been a brown crap flag from the start. It's OK, we can blame Eddie since he also helped write this piece of shit. Shame, Eddie. Shame. I don't know what to tell you. What happened to the Eddie Murphy that wore blue leather suits with 75 zippers and was going to be the next Richard Pryor. I guess Eddie really has followed Richard Pryor in that the movies he did in the twilight of his career were crap too.