Usually, if a movie's less than 90 minutes, it's an animated feature, a dumb comedy or an even stupider action movie. No one really expects to get a quality live action experience from a blockbuster running eighty something minutes as it's probably had the living crap edited out of it following a disastrous test screening (The Avengers / Judge Dredd / Superman 4).
But Barry Sonnenfeld's Men In Black seems completely oblivious to this convention and produces a comedy classic in under an hour and a half. In the short running time we get characters we give a damn about, a grand tour of a new science fiction universe and a loony the-end-is-nigh, world in peril storyline. There are two great masterstrokes here:-
1/ The casting of Tommy Lee Jones and Will Smith as partners is inspired. Surprisingly, it's not the wisecracking Smith that gets the most guffaws, but the perfectly timed, straight man responses from Jones.
2/ The performances are aided by Sonnenfeld's delicate balancing of tone. It's played dead straight, almost like a serious cop thriller. The actors might be dealing with bizarre situations, but emotionally it feel convincing and genuine, never allowing Smith, Jones, Rip Torn and the quirky and cute Linda Fiorentino to get too broad and burst the fragile bubble. On the other end of the scale the director gives us a wacky, cheesy B-movie filled with outrageous 60's inspired sets, icky monsters and Danny Elfman's schlocky, OTT score.
Rick Baker and ILM's effects fuse seamlessly and the perfectly formed script rockets along. It's not a laugh a minute, but the jokes are expertly staged and beautifully timed meaning they're real corkers when they do arrive. I especially like the running gag with Smith not wanting a nickname...and then being called everything under the sun for the rest of the film (kid, tiger, sport, etc). A pity they couldn't think up an original idea for the sequel...including any decent jokes. A shame, as this original deserved its hit status.
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