Robert Townsend's Movie Career

[isiahthomas]

I really like his Hollywood Shuffle & The Five Heartbeats movies. They are both classics & he directed both of them. I was watching The Five Heartbeats last night. I love that movie. He also starred in & directed The Meteor Man which i didn't like at all. It was unreal for a black man to be a superhero. R&B singer Luther Vandross, rappers Big Daddy Kane, Cypress Hill, Naughty By Nature, Marla Gibbs, Robert Guilliame, r&b group Another Bad Creation, Bill Cosby, James Earl Jones were all in this movie. He had a great cast of actors but the movie sucked. He also played in The Mighty Quinn with Denzel Washington as a jamaican who was a crook but he was Denzel's friend. I saw a movie of his on the shelf at Blockbuster Video that came straight to video either last yr or this yr. He plays a vigilante in the movie who wants justice for these bad guys killing people in his neighborhood since the police aren't doing nothin about it. I forgot the name of the movie. Robert doesn't look right playing a vigilante cause he's too silly LOL. Didn't Robert Townsend have his own tv show for a minute back in the 90's? His show was kinda like Cedric The Entertainer's show.

[jamesanthony]

Originally posted by isiahthomas
Didn't Robert Townsend have his own tv show for a minute back in the 90's? His show was kinda like Cedric The Entertainer's show.

Yep. Townsend Television ran for 10 episodes on Fox in the fall of 1993 then got the ole heave ho; it was a bit more innovative than Cedric's series from what I've read (i never saw it though). Parent Hood survived because it was much more conventional (it was targeted at young viewers) and it was one of the first shows on WB. Actually if I were Townsend I would have done the same thing, do a relatively innocuous series, get my residual checks and bounce. He's been laying low ever since though.

[isiahthomas]

Robert is gonna be the host of a new black tv network. I forgot the name of the network but it'll be on the air soon. I saw this news on rap group Public Enemy's website cause somebody had posted a topic about it. I'm glad Robert is still workin. He seems like a nice guy to hang with & talk to.

[GARFIELDKOOL]

He really should stick to working behind the camera rather than appearing on screen. All his movies suck except for Hollywood Shuffle.

[Dr. Jazz]

Robert was good in "A Soldier's Story". The whole cast was outstanding.

[GARFIELDKOOL]

I forgot that one. That was good.

[isiahthomas]

GarfieldKool you didn't like The Five Heartbeats? That's a classic movie.

[GARFIELDKOOL]

That was ok. I wasn't real crazy about it.

[TMC]

http://www.cinema-crazed.com/h-q/MTAP1.htm

Felix Vasquez digs deep in to the library of titles from his childhood to explore the movies he once adored that have showed their age significantly and are now movies he consciously avoids. As capsules of their decade, their overall messages, and their critical standings, he explains why they're movies that have aged poorly.

THE METEOR MAN (1993)
Directed by Robert Townsend
Written by Robert Townsend

I never liked Robert Townsend. He was always self-important, a bit dull, and never had any discerning traits that made me enjoy anything that he ever did. Sure, the man may be important, but I never liked him personally. Even after giving him his fair share again and again, I never saw why he was a man with immense clout. And I never understood why he felt he had to make another superhero movie after this utter failure (2000's "Up Up and Away!").

Watching "Meteor Man" years after its release, it's another preachy PSA about inner city gangs, and horrific comedy painted to look like a positive role model superhero i.e. Meteor Man. Why Meteor Man? Well, years ago upon its release, my cousins and I ate this movie up with a spoon. We loved the way it looked, we loved every single superhero who came to screens, and we enjoyed the comedy that came with the action that Townsend tried to pull with his bonafide Superman rip off.

But years later I realize now what I should have, then. It sucks. Really badly. Back when I was a kid, my dad used to take me and my brother to all the movies we wanted, when he could afford them, mind you. He'd let us see everything from bad action movies, to even worse kids flicks and he endured it. But there was a catch. He always gave his opinion on them, honestly.

My mom would really get mad at him, but he never hesitated to speak his mind, especially when we were alone. If we loved a movie, he'd tell us if he hated it, and we listened to him. To be honest it's probably where I picked up my bad habit of being overly critical and outspoken to a fault. "Meteor Man" was an instance where my dad didn't hesitate in saying "Man, that's stupid."

In one scene that reflect Townsend's utterly rose colored views on inner city life, Meteor Man is going around the city breaking up crime scenes and stopping criminals and we happen upon a big shoot out between cops and gangsters. The gun fire is everywhere, people are falling from the bullets and suddenly Meteor Man crashes the scene to stop the battle. He stops it to a halt.

And then as the cops and gangsters look on in wonder, he signals them to put their guns down begging them to work it out, they comply, and they come together as one meeting him in the middle and dropping their guns.

"That's so stupid!" my dad tisks, "They're gang members, they're going to have to go to jail! What are they going to get together and hug or something?!"

In fact it was so stupid we even laughed, and we were the audience who found this movie to be amazing. Don't get me wrong, my dad always criticized the movies, but he never made fun of us for liking them, and he endured hours of crap for us. But he had a right to speak his mind, and through him we also kind of learned to pick things apart. Thanks paps.

Anyway, the point is, this scene, fictional or not, was idiotic to the point where you wondered if Townsend was just completely delusional. I doubt even Frank Capra would have been this naive. There's no way this scene would work in real life however hard the superhero tried. Superman would never be able to pull this off, and that's only a few of the reasons why "Meteor Man" is a pure failure on every cinematic level possible. It's a contradictory story about an idealistic man in a violent world that's easily altered from an idealistic man. For a movie made to cash in on children's sensibilities and pop culture crazes of the time, this is a movie that ages poorly mainly from my view since it was a hit with us for a long time.

And it's a failure because it's dated so badly, even after fifteen years subsequent its release. While Townsend enlists the talents of great African American comedians, actors, and (then) big hip hop stars like Big Daddy Kane, and Luther Vandros, there's not much for them to do here except lend name credit and credibility to Townsend's superhero comedy and nothing more. There's not much here for anyone to do (Bill Cosby is painfully shoe horned in to the story, too), in spite of their roles as curmudgeons and crusty neighbors who add to the sense of community to the heavy handed movie that takes pounds the messages of inner city life in to our heads ad nauseum.

All the finger wagging is here about bad drug dealers, youths being corrupted by gangs, drugs, and even the old chestnut about the benefit of vegetables all with this wildly derivative tale of a man who is given great superpowers thanks to the help of a mysterious meteor that crashes in to his chest and absorbed in to his body. This is after he's chased in to an alley by the large group of gangsters called "The Golden Lords" who are armed with a giant tiger, members of all ages, and a leader who sports a golden slinkie while standing idly in the dark. Rather than sicking the tiger on him, he's instead chased on foot by a group of gaudily dressed comical gangsters (Don Cheadle is one of the prominent villains of this piece. How far he's come.).

Through these powers he uses them to stop the crime wave crippling his neighborhood, and he becomes this stick thin superhero under a bulky costume. Thanks to the meteor, he's allowed a veritable array of powers or deus ex machinas that provide him with super intelligence through touching a book (another preachy hint at the power of knowledge, and how reading is fundamental), X-Ray vision (a power given only for the sake of comedy and rarely ever used beyond that), talking to animals, super strength, flight, hearing, invincibility and literally anything else Townsend pulls out of his hat that fits the occasion for Meteor Man to come out on top while doling out moral after moral for the kids. "Meteor Man" still has some interesting moments with the fantastic cast, and some laugh out loud scenes including the final fight between Kane and Townsend as they again conveniently crash in to a book mobile and use the information to apply to their fight.

But sadly the positive message is garbled, clunky, and hypocritical. Gangs are bad... but aren't the kids from Another Bad Creation and Big Daddy Kane cool? We must have equality... even if the main villain is an evil Caucasian trying to destroy the lower class. The children are our future... even if they are rotten little bastards in need of some guidance. Gangs are destroying our youth... even if their parents are mostly responsible for their attitudes. Watching it again after so many years, I appreciate what Townsend was going for, but he is so intent on providing a positive message that he talks down to the audience and condescends to the point where it's really insulting, and it's a movie that has aged horribly as the years go on.

It's no wonder "The Meteor Man" has been drawn in to obscurity so many years after its release. But then I can imagine this still being played at Bible Camps and School Assemblies. You're better off showing your kids an instructional video.

[king of comedy]

Originally Posted by Dr. Jazz

Robert was good in "A Soldier's Story". The whole cast was outstanding.

That was a great movie and I loved Hollywood Shuffle. That was the only movie I saw from him.

[TMC]

The Mother Brain Files Underrated Actors Special: Robert Townsend

[isiahthomas]

LOL@TMC writing long paragraphs dissing The Meteor Man hahahahahahahahahahahahahaha. That movie did suck.

[isiahthomas]

He directed a movie not too long ago with Loretta Devine and Michael Clarke Duncan(RIP). Loretta and Michael played school teachers and they were teaching at a school for bad black kids. It was sorta like a special needs school for only bad kids. I wanna check it out because the previews i saw looked good. He also did a movie that's several years old that he was married to Victoria Rowell who played Drucilla on Young and the Restless soap opera and Faizon Love is also in it. It's a black family movie that deals with issues that most black families go through like crime in their neighborhood and black kids being conned into being criminals so they can get money and Robert's kids still being upset about Robert's first wife getting killed when they were young.

[TMC]

Originally Posted by GARFIELDKOOL

He really should stick to working behind the camera rather than appearing on screen. All his movies suck except for Hollywood Shuffle.

I think why Robert Townsend's career didn't exactly take off following his late '80s-early '90s "peak" was because:
*He was arguably a bit "ahead of his time" so to speak. Robert Townsend was perhaps the Tyler Perry of his heyday. I guess Townsend was a bit "too black for Hollywood" at the time if that makes sense.

*After the failures (both critically and commercially, at least in regards to breaking even) of The Meteor Man and BAPs (which he didn't star in, just directed) he probably could no longer get proper funding for his "passion projects" (hence, he had to turn to TV).

*Him breaking ties w/ Kenan Ivory Wayans kind of "exposed" Townsend in that he arguably didn't have enough of an "edge" in his comedy (it seemed like he always had to rely/differ heavily on the talents of others instead of getting by on his own charisma or personality). It seems like when Townsend is left to his own devices (such as The Meteor Man or The Parent 'Hood), he has to indulge in a lot of heavy-handed moralizing to offset his comedy.

[isiahthomas]

I can't believe he directed BAPS LOL. That movie sucked even though I like Halle Berry and AJ Johnson. He also directed Bill Cosby's recent standup concert Far From Finished and he directed Eddie Murphy's RAW standup movie. Both of them are good.