MouseHunt (1997)

Highly Overrated But Still Good

It's not great by any means, but it's a pretty good movie that didn't leave me filled with regret for investing time in it.

Very good movie overall, highly recommended. Most of the negative reviews don't have any merit and are all pollitically based. Give this movie a chance at least, and it might give you a different perspective.

It is neither dumb nor smart enough to be fun, and spends way too much time with its boring human characters.

Mouse Hunt is a movie that I watched for the first time at least 10 years ago. I wanted to revisit for a while now and seeing as how Gore Verbinski has a new movie coming out now, there wasn't a better time to do it! I don't have many memories regarding the movie, or huge nostalgia towards it, but I always remembered how it was the live-action Tom & Jerry movie that I wanted to see. The movie follows two brothers, Ernie and Lars, whose father dies and leaves them his string factory and a huge abandoned house. Upon finding out the house is worth over a million dollars, they want to sell it. Of course, there's always an obstacle. Here, the obstacle is a very cunning and clever mouse that just won't get himself caught no matter how hard the brothers try. That's basically the plot of the movie. It's a 90 minute slapstick comedy that doesn't have much more to it, but damn is it charming. There's something wonderful about seeing two grown men getting outsmarted by a little mouse. The comedy reminded me a lot of Laurel & Hardy in the best way possible! I used to watch a lot of Laurel & Hardy when I was younger and I couldn't stop seeing the similarities between the two main characters here and Laurel & Hardy. The slapstick is very well done. There's some scenes that really got to me and some scenes that didn't quite hit, but most of it was hit, rather than miss. The set design is perfect! I love the look of the house and the way the scenes with the mouse in the walls are shot is very impressive. I was very surprised to see how well this movie was directed. The CGI, as well, impressive. This movie was made in 1997 and some of the animated animals look better than in movies today! The acting's great. I always loved Lee Evans and his charisma. There's just something about him that cheers me up a lot. His reactions to everything and his voice are perfect for a movie like this! Nathan Lane as his brother was great, as well. Christopher Walken also appears shortly in the movie as this badass exterminator that sees catching mice as going to the war. It's very amusing and entertaining. All in all, Mouse Hunt is really worth the watch if you're a fan of the older slapstick comedy movies. I'm not talking about Adam Sandler level of slapstick, I'm talking about Laurel & Hardy, Abbott & Costello type of slapstick. The good type of slapstick.

Mouse Hunt (1997): Dir: Gore Verbinski / Cast: Nathan Lane, Lee Evans, Christopher Walken, Vicki Lewis, Michael Jeter: I couldn't understand why children laughed. A mouse hurls aimlessly through the air and lands between a woman's breasts and a man reaches in after it. Her friend smiles and plunges her date's hand between her breasts. We witness a psychotic cat snagged in mouse traps. There are suggestions of sex yet this is packaged as a family film. Nathan Lane and Lee Evans try shamelessly to kill a mouse so that they can profit off the house, and while they're at it, they may have killed their careers. Director Gore Verbinski runs about like the mouse itself permitting anything save for a plot. He is aided only by its production, which contains a Capra style visual appeal, but it is far from anything remotely evident of the quality of a Capra film. Lane and Evans fall victim to countless stunts that seem inspired by Home Alone. Christopher Walken is wasted as an exterminator who goes through Looney Tune accidents. Then there is Vicki Lewis and Michael Jeter both making career suicide. It seems to suggest compromise and solution, however these themes hardly represent the true agenda of this dog show. With that said, it should indicates that families can attend a better film as a solution to seeing this one. Perhaps this worthless family film travesty can be snagged in mouse traps. Score: 1 / 10

This movie is so funny. Nathan Lane and Lee Evans are the sons of a man that died that owned a string factory.Right in the beginning the fun starts. The brothers argue about the color of Lee/Lars Smuntz's funeral clothes. As they walk down the stairs of the church the handle breaks off the casket, their father's body goes flying out of the casket, into the air and down a open manhole in the street.The characters are all funny. The animation is amazing. Nathan/Ernie Smuntz has a restaurant and serves dinner to the Mayor who is very fat who is with his family. His daughters see a cockroach without a head running across the table. The Mayor realizes he has eaten the head. He falls back in the chair and passes out. The movement of this giant roach running on the table is so hysterical. The sons inherit a house from their father who was kind of weird. No one lives in the house and when the men go there they find a mouse who is like the owner of the house. He crawls in all the spaces and takes what he wants and just takes over and causes problems for the sons. The animation of what the mouse does and what they do to catch it is so funny.The sons end up hiring a man to trap the mouse. The exterminator is played by Christopher Walkens. He is really good in this movie. He has his own equipment and is experienced. He talks loud so the mouse will hear what he has to say because he believes the mouse understands him from his experience and he is trying to fool it. More laughter.The mouse is smarter than everyone this is a great funny movie to see.

When their father dies, Ernie & Lars inherit an old house and the family string factory. Lars, the loyal son, refuses to sell the factory, which angers his wife so she kicks him out. Ernie, who runs a restaurant, is suddenly left with nothing when the mayor dies while eating there. With no other place to go, the brothers shack up at the old house, and then finding out the place is worth a fortune. They decide to fix up the place and sell it in an auction, but first, they have to get rid of a mouse living in the walls.......Proving that Gore Verbinski started out as a great director, and around 2002 sold himself to Disney, mouse hunt is a family film with a hideous dark side. Think the film as a hybrid between Home Alone and The People under the stairs, and it for the most part it works, but the supporting characters really spoil the broth.Walken and Hickey are brilliant, but they are just cameos, and apart from Jeter, all the other supporting characters are walking tropes. The money hungry wife, the rich fat buyers, and the stereotypical gangsters, just make the film feel less unique.Evans and Lane make a good pairing and their physical comedy usurps anything Harry and Marv got up to.The CGI looks a little bit ropes now, especially Catzilla, but it really adds to the silliness of it all.Its highly predictable stuff, you know the house will get destroyed, and you know that all will well come the end.Worth seeing, but don't expect anything groundbreaking.