Fanboys

Plot Summary and Target Audience Described in One Word Title

There's a good chance that if you're some level of movie geek, you did hear about this movie. Most likely it was in the context of the controversy surrounding Harvey Weinstein's attempts to re-edit the film to remove a subplot where a character was dying of cancer. You also probably didn't see it because it rolled through theaters and onto DVD with barely a mention on even Adult Swim.

So to answer your questions in order, yes the cancer subplot is there and yes, if you liked Star Wars you'll probably enjoy this movie... but it does have it's faults.

Now for those of you who never heard of Fanboys, the story follows a group of friends from Ohio who made plans to infiltrate the Skywalker Ranch (George Lucas's home) when they were kids. By the time they've grown up, its 1998 and, one of the group, Eric, is primed to take over his family's used car business. The rest of his friends still act like they're in grade school. When another of the group, Linus, finds out he has cancer, they decide to go through with their childhood plan. In particular, they've decided they will steal a rough cut of Star Wars Episode I - The Phantom Menace, so that Linus can see it before he dies.

Naturally, what follows is a madcap cross country road trip filled with nerd references and an occasional sexual encounter. They rumble with Trekkies at the town where Captain Kirk was born (Shatner's Kirk, not Chris Pine.) One of them gets beat up by Harry Knowles from Ain't It Cool News. An of course, and endless stream of Star Wars gags ranging from the overt to the subtle.

While there are alot of good gags, there are a few occasions where something was a bit off about the execution. The joke would be funny, but had the potential to be way funnier. For example, in the aforementioned Star Trek rumble, the filmmakers couldn't get the rights to use the actual Star Trek uniform designs, so instead they use "parody" uniforms. Its a minor distraction in that it took me a while to actually get that they were supposed to be Star Trek uniforms, which sort of took me out of the moment. However, the scene is saved by a cameo appearance by Seth Rogen as a Trekkie who does not take kindly to somebody ripping on Captain Kirk.

On top of that the subplots could have used a bit more fleshing out. Once they hit the road the film pretty much forgets that the characters are all supposed to be running away from something back home. Eric's story about taking over the family business would have been nice to see fleshed out, but you can't fault a movie too much for sticking to it's main premise.

In spite of all that, it's an alright movie It's not of the calibre of film that it would have been worth seeing in theaters, but it's certainly worth checking out as a rental. Clearly the people who made it have a deep love of all things Star Wars, but you'll probably leave it wondering why it wasn't directed by Kevin Smith. Sadly, he only makes a cameo appearance, but then again so does anybody else famous who's tied to Star Wars. My favorite might be Billy Dee Williams as Judge Reinhold. (It makes sense, trust me.)

The film's strengths come when it plays on the sense of nostalgia for the excitement alot of us felt at the prospect of a new trilogy of Star Wars movies coming out. If you're like me, you probably thought the original trilogy was the most amazing contribution to cinema ever, so the idea of there being more to the story was simply mind blowing. The characters capture that perfectly. It also brings back memories of what it was like being a nerd in the late 90's. You know, back when the internet was still new, and if you got the inside scoop on something it meant something. Not like today where if something gets leaked online, the whole world is going to know about it in half a day.

At the very least, it should bring back memories of your first time seeing Episode I. For me, I'd managed to rally friends together for the Special Edition releases of the original trilogy, and Episodes II and III, yet for some reason I couldn't get a damn one of my friends to go with me on opening day of Phantom Menace. Their reason? They wanted to wait until the crowd died down.

You guys kind of suck, you know that?