Get Shorty (1995)

Get Shorty: 1995, dir. Barry Sonnenfeld. Seen on DVD (Jan 16).
Get Shorty was on my list of films to see last year because it is one of those films that people are always appalled that I say I haven’t seen. Well, everyone except my little brother, who loaned me the DVD with a shrug and said it was somewhat overrated and told me not to worry about getting it back to him in a hurry. In fact, he hadn’t even unwrapped the packaging from the DVD.
But I found Get Shorty to be a nice entertaining movie. Nothing to get overly excited about, but a good movie to curl up on the couch and watch and enjoy.

The DVD itself was a little annoying, because it was two-sided with the letterboxed version on one side and the full-screen version on the other side. I couldn’t tell which side was which from the label, so I had to put it in the DVD player and hope for the best. (I got it wrong and had to try again.)
I liked Get Shorty because it had a lot of amusing film jokes, but for the most part you didn’t feel left out if you didn’t get something. The movie’s entertainment did not hinge on the audience having a basic knowledge of current film stuff, which is good because no one’s going to remember all the details of the Hollywood film industry in 1995.
I remember reading Get Shorty a few years ago, but I don’t remember much about it apart from the general storyline and the main characters. I could see where it would make a good movie, with lots of quirky colorful characters. Hollywood has been very good to Elmore Leonard, unlike, say, poor Carl Hiaasen.
Gene Hackman was wonderful but it’s difficult to think of a movie in which Gene Hackman is ever not wonderful. Even in slight movies (that one with Anne Archer that I saw in college and can’t remember the title) and lame movies and dated movies (The Poseidon Adventure), it’s a pleasure to watch him. I first saw him in Superman, was completely enamored, and have never looked back.
But then I enjoyed watching everyone in this movie, even John Travolta, whom I tend to find somewhat irritating.
All in all, as I said, a Nice Little Movie. Entertaining without being particularly memorable. Probably not worthy of the fuss people made because I hadn’t seen it, but certainly worth taking the wrapper off your DVD and watching it once in awhile.