Rocketman (PG, 1997)

Fred Z. Randall (Harland Williams) is a man who has dreamed about space travel for as long as he can remember. Now 30 and still living at home with a mother who makes his sandwiches for him, Fred creates software programs for NASA simulations. When the most recent one he created for a mission to Mars seemingly malfunctions and the astronaut scheduled for the trip gets injured in Fred's office (the first of many injuries and pratfalls to come), Fred gets the chance of a lifetime: To train with and travel to the moon with legendary space cowboy "Wild Bill" Overbeck (William Sadler) and the beautiful biologist Julie Ford (Jessica Lundy).

ROCKETMAN looks, from the DVD cover and the beginning of the story, like a warm-hearted, family movie. The more you watch, however, the more you get the sense that this isn't a Disney movie of the Son of Flubber or the classic Shaggy Dog caliber. Instead, it's just another sophomoric fantasy with a little toilet humor to round it out.

The premise should give you the first hint that this film is totally absurd. What's unfortunate is that it isn't absurd in the good, clean way that the original Nutty Professor was. Instead, it's tinged with the immaturity of American Pie and the toilet humor of Dumb and Dumber -- but it's not as good as either of those. Having eaten all the food on the ship, Fred serves his fellow astronauts microwaved toothpaste and hemorrhoid cream. He loses a prized medallion in the space toilet and goes after it. He passes gas in his space suit and it gets transmitted to his fellow astronaut. It's funny, sure -- and your 8-year-old will likely love it. But it's not great. And it's not the kind of movie you keep around for years to come.

Studio: Walt Disney Pictures
Director: Stuart Gillard
Cast: Beau Bridges, Harland Williams, Jessica Lundy
Genre: Family and Kids
Run time: 94 minutes
Theatrical release: June 20, 1997
DVD release: May 17, 2007
MPAA Rating: PG
MPAA explanation: language, crude humor and thematic elements