Fat Albert (PG, 2004)

Hey hey hey! Fat Albert is back. This live action-film is based on Bill Cosby's comedy and the 1970's animated television show. A lonely teenaged girl named Doris (Kyla Pratt) watches the Fat Albert cartoon show after school. When her tear falls onto the remote control, Fat Albert knows he must help her. So he climbs right out of the television set and into her living room, and the whole gang comes along (Rudy, Mushmouth, Dumb Donald, Weird Harold, and Bill and his pesky little brother Russell). Dressed in their fly 70's outfits, they're completely befuddled by newfangled inventions like soda can flip-tops and cell phones. Present-day characters are mostly equally befuddled by the gang's 70's animation qualities (Fat Albert wins a race with a track star using his cartoon glide/shuffle and Dumb Donald cannot take off that face-covering hat because he is not sure there is anything underneath). But some, including Doris' sweet and pretty foster sister, are taken with their old-school charm.

The story-telling in FAT ALBERT is so gentle that it barely registers, made up of disconnected moments almost as thought it was limited to the brief skit-like segments of the old cartoon show. What little narrative momentum builds up is quickly dissipated without being resolved. Music video star and valet/stylist to rap stars Farnsworth Bentley has a nice cameo as a clothing store salesman, but it is unlikely that his participation will matter to the intended audience for this film.

Cosby appears as himself to talk to Fat Albert and in a poignant epilogue at the grave of the real Fat Albert, again not something that will be very meaningful to the children in the audience. The children might also be concerned about why Doris' mother and father are not around and what happened to her foster sister's family. As Fat Albert and his friends stay in the real world too long, they start to fade away. But by then the movie itself seems faded. The film feels muddled and unsure of its audience, as out of its time as Fat Albert and the gang.

Studio: Twentieth Century Fox
Director: Joel Zwick
Cast: Aaron Carter, Kenan Thompson, Omarion Grandberry
Genre: Family and Kids
Run time: 90 minutes
Theatrical release: December 25, 2004
DVD release: March 22, 2005
MPAA Rating: PG
MPAA explanation: momentary language