The Warner Bros. Studio Tour Movie, a.k.a. Space Jam: A New Legacy (2021), is as corporate of a commercial product as it can get. The way all the characters from Warner Bros.' existing intellectual properties (ranging from the likes of King Kong, the Iron Giant, Superman, and the Flintstones to the Agents from The Matrix (1999), the titular creatures from Gremlins (1984), Pennywise the Clown from It (2017), and Baby Jane from What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962)) cheering on NBA superstar LeBron James and the Looney Tunes gang during the third act's big game with little to no storytelling rhyme or reason make the cameo appearances from Warner's own Ready Player One (2018) look masterful by comparison. The main difference being that a director like Steven Spielberg was at the helm of Ready Player One and was allowed by the studio to take an IP-heavy movie and tell it through the lens of a The Goonies (1985)-style adventure combined with visual spectacle and social commentary on a dystopic pop culture-obsessed society. Such is not the case for director Malcolm D. Lee or whoever called the shots from behind the scenes, for most of this movie feels like it was made entirely by committee.
While technically a sequel to 1996's Space Jam starring Michael Jordan and Bugs Bunny, this movie contains none of the original's self-referential humor, lively direction, and catchy soundtrack. Granted, upping a movie's stakes and overall scale from the original is essential; doing so by stuffing the screen with miscellaneous and unrelated movie Easter eggs and references is not the way to go. There is a moment where Wile E. Coyote and the Road Runner have been digitally inserted into a scene from Mad Max: Fury Road (2015), which I found to be pretty clever and funny. Other than that, the rest of this film's visual gags are as unimaginative and off-putting as I expected from a movie made by Warner executives. However, there are a few positives within this heavy-handed Warner Bros./HBO Max commercial.
For starters, there is a decent story buried beneath the studio noise. NBA superstar LeBron James is trying to connect with his son through basketball, but his son (played by Cedric Joe) is more interested in video game programming. LeBron's performance is commendable, and that is where the movie shines brightest, surprisingly. Also, Don Cheadle as the evil Al-G Rhythm (the Warner Bros. Studio's artificial intelligence-driven computer server) is quite fun to watch as a calculating and manipulative antagonist. Unfortunately, about ten minutes into this movie, I could feel an immediate shift in the overall direction from a family sports drama to a virtual studio tour. It almost feels like the Warner executives thought they knew better, stepped in, sidelined the various creative voices, and highjacked the movie to fit their likings. Their logic appears to be: throw the Looney Tunes gang and their traditionally drawn high jinks into a LeBron James-led movie, plus a whole lot of executive and creative micromanagement, and you get a movie. However, the final product is an unsatisfying mess that not only renders much of LeBron's efforts as an actor and team player inert but fails to deliver in telling an emotional bonding experience with families but in creating a decent follow-up to a '90s cult classic.
Despite LeBron's best efforts, he alone cannot save this film from becoming the blatant studio commercial that is Space Jam: A New Legacy. If you are looking for an entertaining movie to stream on HBO Max, revisit the original Space Jam. It is funnier and likelier to age better, entertain, and leave a better influence on children than this significant let-down of a movie (if I can call it that).
Final Score: 4 out of 10
Comments