It’s interesting when certain movies or books or TV shows display life after a lackluster initial release.
I recall many, many years ago, 1982 to be exact, when the Wes Craven directed Swamp Thing landed in theaters. I was attending high school at a boarding facility and distinctly recall seeing a commercial for the film for the first time with a group of friends. Everyone, and I mean everyone around me hooted and scoffed at the commercial. They were certain the film was a total POS.
These same people were even more astonished when I told them I knew about the character and actually liked the Len Wein/Berni Wrightson comic book it was based on (at that point Alan Moore’s take on the character was still to come, though the movie did result in a new Swamp Thing series which, eventually, led to Alan Moore’s arrival on the U.S. comic book scene).
In fact, I loved (still love!) those original 10 issues of the Wein/Wrightson Swamp Thing so much that, risking considerable teenage ridicule, I went to see the film when it was released a week or so later.
Other than me, there was absolutely no one in the theater.
To say the least, Swamp Thing, the movie, was a complete bust. But something curious happened on the way to its irrelevancy. The movie was released to cable and, lo and behold, people saw it and realized it wasn’t the total crap-fest they thought it was. I’d be the last person to vigorously defend the merits of the film, but it did carry enough of the old Wein/Wrightson comic book ideas to make it at the very least an enjoyable time killer.
The eventual unlikely success of that film led to a second Swamp Thing film, a TV series, a cartoon series, and, of course, the emergence of author Alan Moore. And this isn’t counting offshoots like John Constantine (an Alan Moore creation who first appeared in Swamp Thing and subsequently has appeared in movies and a TV show, among others).
Which brings us to the 2001 Ben Stiller film Zoolander. According to Box Office Mojo, the film was made for approximately $28 million and grossed $45 million, which makes it profitable but not anywhere near approaching blockbuster status (the amount the movie was made for doesn’t include advertising costs).
If memory serves, the film left theaters fairly quickly, though perhaps the movie did suffer from the fact that it was released on September 28 of 2001, very shortly after the tragic events of 9/11, and people maybe weren’t in much of a mood for humorous movies.
Yet not unlike Swamp Thing, the film had a rebirth of sorts over time. After its initial release more and more people got to see the film and they apparently liked what they saw. In 2016, a full fifteen years after its release, Zoolander 2 will arrive to theaters.
In all this time, I’ve caught bits and pieces of Zoolander on TV but never sat through the entire film. Until now.
What I found was an amusing -if light- comedy that takes an interesting almost science fictional plot as its storyline: What if we lived in a world where males were supermodels? And what if someone like Ben Stiller and Owen Wilson -two people we would hardly classify as top models in any reality- were the two hottest models out there?
Further, what if both of them are crushingly stupid and become involved in a Manchurian Candidate-style plot to kill off a Malaysian ruler, a man who wants to create child labor laws in his country which will inevitably hurt the fashion industry that thrives on creating their clothing using very, very cheap labor of this kind?
Zoolander isn’t the best comedy I’ve ever seen, not by a long shot, but it is very funny -hilariously so at times- and breezes by. Within the film you get some fascinating cameos (including amusing ones featuring Billy Zane and David Bowie), along with equally amusing appearances by Will Ferrell, Milla Jovovich, and David Duchovny.
What I found most incredible about Zoolander is that the writers, including Ben Stiller, managed to create an almost James Bondian-type plot that logically revolves around issues of fashion and the creation thereof. Sure the film features plenty of “stupid” humor (which if done right I absolutely love…check out the whole pouring gas scene early in the film), but to have a plot that actually touches on something as real as child labor laws and the fact that top fashion industries rely on cheap labor to get their products out there?
Rather stunning.
As I said before, Zoolander isn’t the very best comedy I’ve ever seen but it is quite humorous and -dare I say it?- clever in its own way. I can certainly understand why this film found life after a so-so first release. Recommended.