Transcript of Roger Ebert & Gene Siskel reviewing North

Roger Ebert

I have no idea why Rob Reiner, or anyone else, wanted to make this story into a movie, and close examination of the film itself is no help. "North" is one of the most unpleasant, contrived, artificial, cloying experiences I've had at the movies. To call it manipulative would be inaccurate; it has an ambition to manipulate, but fails.

The film stars Elijah Wood, who is a wonderful young actor (and if you don't believe me, watch his version of "The Adventures of Huck Finn"). Here he is stuck in a story that no actor, however wonderful, however young, should be punished with. He plays a kid with inattentive parents, who decides to go into court, free himself of them, and go on a worldwide search for nicer parents.

This idea is deeply flawed. Children do not lightly separate from their parents - and certainly not on the evidence provided here, where the great parental sin is not paying attention to their kid at the dinner table. The parents (Julia Louis-Dreyfus and Jason Alexander) have provided little North with what looks like a million-dollar house in a Frank Capra neighborhood, all on dad's salary as a pants inspector. And, yes, I know that is supposed to be a fantasy, but the pants-inspecting jokes are only the first of several truly awful episodes in this film.

North goes into court, where the judge is Alan Arkin, proving without the slightest shadow of a doubt that he should never, ever appear again in public with any material even vaguely inspired by Groucho Marx. North's case hits the headlines, and since he is such an all-star overachiever, offers pour in from would-be parents all over the world, leading to an odyssey that takes him to Texas, Hawaii, Alaska, and elsewhere.

What is the point of the scenes with the auditioning parents? (The victimized actors range from Dan Aykroyd as a Texan to Kathy Bates as an Eskimo). They are all seen as broad, desperate comic caricatures. They are not funny. They are not touching. There is no truth in them. They don't even work as parodies. There is an idiocy here that seems almost intentional, as if the filmmakers plotted to leave anything of interest or entertainment value out of these episodes.

North is followed on his travels by a mysterious character who appears in many guises. He is the Easter bunny, a cowboy, a beach bum, and a Federal Express driver who works in several product plugs.

Funny, thinks North; this guy looks familiar. And so he is. All of the manifestations are played by Bruce Willis, who is not funny, or helpful, in any of them.

I hated this movie. Hated hated hated hated hated this movie. Hated it. Hated every simpering stupid vacant audience-insulting moment of it. Hated the sensibility that thought anyone would like it. Hated the implied insult to the audience by its belief that anyone would be entertained by it.

I hold it as an item of faith that Rob Reiner is a gifted filmmaker; among his credits are "This Is Spinal Tap," "The Sure Thing," "The Princess Bride," "Stand By Me," "When Harry Met Sally...," and "Misery." I list those titles as an incantation against this one.

"North" is a bad film - one of the worst movies ever made. But it is not by a bad filmmaker, and must represent some sort of lapse from which Reiner will recover - possibly sooner than I will.

Siskel & Ebert 

• Announcer: Bruce Willis plays guardian angel to Elijah Wood in North.
• Roger Ebert: When we come back, a kid decides to dump his old parents and go looking for some new ones in North.
• [A movie clip from early on starts it it.]
• Roger Ebert: A boy played by Elijah Wood gets fed up with his folk in that scene from North and that since they don’t pay attention him, he will divorce them (misspoke as him) and go looking for a new set of parents and that’s set up for one of the most thoroughly hateful movies in recent years. A movie that makes me cringe even when I'm sitting here thinking about it. Look at this scene for example where young North is in court trying to dump his parents who are comatose with shock. 
• [movie clip plays before another one does with ethnic stereotyping] 
• Roger Ebert: Then there’s a series of auditions as would-be parents from around the country try out for the role of North’s new mom and dad. Dan Aykroyd & Reba McEntire are a couple of absurd (misspoke as absury) Texans who want to adopt him. [audio plays]
• [The next movie clip of more ethnic stereotyping] 
• Roger Ebert: Next stop, the Hawaiian islands where we get some amazingly tasteless dialogue about why these two people don’t have children [audio is heard]
• [A series of clips play] 
• Roger Ebert: A mysterious character keeps turning up on North’s travels. He’s played by Bruce Willis as an Easter Bunny, a western ranch hand, a beach comer and a Federal Express driver who gets in lots of product plugs. 
• [audio plays] 
• [Clip of the Eskimos plays] 
• Roger Ebert: I hated this movie as much as any movie we have ever reviewed in the 19 years we've been doing this show. I hated it because of the premise, which seems shockingly cold-hearted, and because this premise is being suggested to kids as children's entertainment, and because everybody in the movie was vulgar and stupid, and because the jokes weren't funny, and because most of the characters were obnoxious, and because of the phony attempt to add a little pseudo-hip philosophy with the Bruce Willis character. Now I think Elijah Wood is a fine young actor and of course Rob Reiner, the director, has made one terrific movie after another so I prefer to consider North as just a very unfortunate aberration in these otherwise admirable careers. 
• Gene Siskel: Well, I mean I think you gotta hold Rob Reiner's feet to the fire here. I mean, he's the guy in charge . . . he's saying this is entertainment . . . it's deplorable. There isn't a gag that works. You couldn't write worse jokes if I told you to write worse jokes.” 
• Roger Ebert: And of course, you could always [Siskel interrupts him] 
• Gene Siskel: The ethnic stereotyping is appalling [Ebert agrees “Yes”] It's embarrassing . . . you feel unclean as you're sitting there. It's junk. First-class junk! 
• Roger Ebert: And then the idea that kids could be lured in by television ads to see this movie about a little child who, you know, throws away his parents. He goes shopping for a new set. It's really... [Gene interrupts him]
• Gene Siskel: Any subject could be done well; this is just trash, Roger.
• Roger Ebert: Two walloping thumbs down for North, the distasteful story of a little boy who goes shopping for new parents. Gene and I had a little contest to see which one of us hated this movie the most; it was a tie.

Worst of 1994

• Gene Siskel: And now at long last, the worst, the worst movie of 1994, the movie Roger and I each would least like to sit through a second time, the single worst picture of ‘94 and I thought about Mixed Nuts which just came out of Christmas time, but my choice is another cataclysmically unfunny comedy it’s called North directed by Rob Reiner of all people written by Alan Zweibel about a boy named North played by Elijah Wood who wants to divorce his parents and so this is sort of trading mom and dad and the parents he interview as possible replacements are just one dreadful unfunny stereotype after another in a film that often looks like outtakes from old travel logs. Here are the Hawaiian parents North meets [clip plays]. And here are the Eskimo parents he interviews. [clip plays] That’s supposed to be humor in the 1990s? North also manages to be quite offensive in a single shot and a joke about a praying acidic Jew testing pants a totally thoughtless tasteless scene. I know what went wrong with this movie; everything, it’s shabby and it’s mean.
• Roger Ebert: Well, Gene, I had to think a long time to pick my worst picture of 1994 about a 1/10 of a second and I believe it or not, it’s the same one that you chose, [Gene interrupts him] it’s a study we kept this a secret from each other and unfortunately, I think I liked it even less than you do if that’s possible, my choice is also North. All of the many different kinds of parents young North auditions have one thing in common: they appear in scenes of starling stupidity and offensive caricature and one scene in particular that a new low in bad taste is this one where the Eskimo would-be parents in their aging father played by Abe Vigoda off to die along with other members of the community who have outlived their usefulness. What a heartwarming message for kids. [clip plays] and then [regarding "North"] When it came time to write my newspaper review of this movie, I dunno, something just came over me, my fingers on the keyboard had little minds of their own, I was rolling along, writing my usual scathing but civilized comments, when suddenly, a sinister inner force took over, and I found myself typing, and I quote: "I HATED this movie! Hated hated hated hated hated this movie! Hated it! Hated every simpering, stupid, vacant, audience-insulting moment of it!" Unquote. And so on. Altogether, I used the word "hated" ten times. I have to give "North" credit for one thing, though: When I was preparing for this show, I didn't have to spend a lot of time trying to figure out which was the year's worst movie. So, it saved me time.
• Gene Siskel: You know, I talked to the writer of this picture, I was so thunderstruck by Alan Zweibel, and I think that maybe these guys and Rob Reiner are using a, uh, sort of old style comedy that really has just gone out of fashion. It was funny sometimes when Mel Brooks took some of these caricatures in the early seventies, but he did it with a kind of liveliness. This stuff just clangs.
• Roger Ebert: Well, you maybe do it more broadly or with more burlesque, but here I mean the idea of a kid shopping for new parents is not intrinsically funny and so unless you really know how to handle it, you’re really shopping for designers.
• Gene Siskel: It didn’t work with treading mom and it didn’t work for North. That’s it for this special show. Now don’t you feel better having done it?