Monkeybone

Monkeybone," now here's a gamble of a movie. Hollywood has held a brief history in the combination of live-action and animation. Gene Kelly danced with Jerry the mouse in "Anchors Aweigh" in 1945. Forty-three years later, Hollywood struck gold in "Who Framed Roger Rabbit?" and then impaled itself on "Cool World" only a few years later. Perhaps this genre can only go so far. \n"But 'Monkeybone' dives into computer animation," you say. Good excuse for a revival? Only if it's entertaining, and as ridiculously eye-rolling as it is sometimes, "Monkeybone" succeeds. \nThe plot is as silly and convoluted as they come. When a freak car accident sends Stu Miley (cartoonist and famous creator of over-the-top animated ape Monkeybone) into a coma, his "soul" of some sorts is sent into a surreal limbo land that just begs for art direction Oscars. This is the land of nightmares, a kind of Toontown on drugs where comatose victims have to wait for their bodies to wake up or die. It is also a place where Stu meets his devious creation in the fur (voiced by John Turturro), who proceeds to trick the system into going back to Earth himself using Stu's body for a sinister plot. Got this so far?\nNot that it should matter anyway, for if "Monkeybone" relied strictly upon its plot line, the movie would fail. What we count on here are the wonderful physically comedic performances of Brendan Fraser and Chris Kattan, who appropriately plays prehistoric monkey-man Mr. Peepers on "Saturday Night Live." Viewing his out-of-bounds performance, it's not much of a wonder Fraser has been called the Buster Keaton of today, driving his physical-comedic abilities to the limit. But Kattan has him beat by just a stretch, contorting his body with such seamless eye-popping power that he almost outdoes his limit-defying co-starring toons.\nThe rest of the movie could be called cute, with a few brilliant scenes hilariously portraying our stock-filled media world. And just when we think it's going a tad bit too far, we remember this movie is called "Monkeybone." Leave your brain at the door, and you might find yourself laughing. This is no place for reason.