2001: A Space Travesty

I just wanted to make that joke because this movie is painfully awful.

This is another spoof movie starring Leslie Nielsen, and I first heard of it a while ago, and knew it was obviously a sci-fi spoof. The title is derived from Stanley Kubrick's groundbreaking 1968 film, "2001: A Space Odyssey", though this film is certainly not entirely a parody of that one. I've seen that particular Kubrick movie several times, but was not as impressed with it during my last viewing, in January 2008. Still, the title of this 2000 comedy, "2001: A Space Travesty", was what brought it to my attention, since I obviously know where this title came from. I could see that this was not one of Nielsen's popular spoofs, but after a while, and only about 24 hours after first watching "Airplane!", an earlier parody film with Nielsen (and a MUCH better one) this week, I watched this despised sci-fi comedy. While I didn't find it to be QUITE as bad as many others have (maybe most other people who have seen in at some point in the past decade think it's worse than I do), I still thought it was a lousy attempt at comedy, so I can't defend it.

Marshall "Dick" Dix is a clumsy detective who is informed that the President of the United States (a nameless character, but obviously based on Bill Clinton) is being held captive on a moon base called Vegan and has been replaced by a clone! The detective is sent out of Earth's atmosphere to this moon base, on a mission to rescue the real president and find out who's responsible for the crime. He is accompanied on this mission by an officer named Cassandra Menage. Together, the two of them make it to Vegan, where they see that there are many beings around, both human and alien. Dix and Menage begin their inspection, which will obviously not be helped by Dix's clumsiness. After defeating the evil Dr. Griffin Pratt and his hoodlums in a fight, thanks largely to Menage's martial arts skills, the two inspectors escape from the moon and take the president with them. Back on Earth, Dix puts who he thinks is the real president back in the White House, but it turns out he has just replaced the real president with the clone! Even though the detective has messed up, it's still up to him to save his home planet, so the mission which started with a trip to the moon now continues on Earth!

"2001: A Space Odyssey" is obviously too slow paced for some viewers, and it did seem too slow to me the last time I watched it, but with only one viewing of "2001: A Space TRAVESTY", it seemed to me that it had the opposite problem, it was too fast! The direction seems so rushed and unfocused, and so does Leslie Nielsen's narration. Unfortunately, the problems certainly don't end here. The movie is full of very juvenile and unfunny humour, and since it's a comedy, that's its main problem. This already shows during the opening sequence and is featured in many other scenes, including the penis jokes about the main protagonist's name, Dix trying to use a spaceship toilet on the way to the moon just as the artificial gravity is turned off, a human on the moon coming out of the bathroom covered in alien waste, condoms which are found later in the film, etc. There are so many gags here which obviously took no comedic talent whatsoever to come up with! Not only does the toilet humour fail, so does the slapstick, with such occurrences as Dix accidentally making a huge mess during his inspection on Vegan. The gags generally seem like they were just thrown in with very little or no thought put into them. In addition to that, the film also seemed too noisy to me.

Unfortunately, with all this movie's flaws, it's most certainly a misfire. Leslie Nielsen's character here is like Lieutenant Frank Drebin, his character in the "Naked Gun" series (they're both clumsy detectives), but if you're a fan of any or all of those movies, that certainly doesn't mean you're guaranteed to like this later spoof. I remember one time when I was in high school, a student was banned from my school bus route after playing with a dildo during the ride home and giving the bus driver attitude when he told him to get off the bus. "2001: A Space Travesty" seems like it was written by hyperactive high school students like that guy! I'll admit, I did smile at times while watching this film, but this was VERY rare, and I never actually laughed. Not only did it not make me laugh, I may have had a slight headache while watching it, which the film didn't help. Yes, my rating for this sci-fi spoof is 4/10, which is higher than what seems to be the most popular rating for it, but I still don't like it. I even feel like 4/10 just might be too generous, and know that many people would believe that saying this rating is too generous is an understatement! If you've never watched this unpopular 2000 comedy, I strongly suggest you don't, whether you like Nielsen's comedy roles in general or not.

Leslie Nielsen is one of the most funniest comedians in Hollywood. He should've retired from acting with honour, before starring in this horrible unfunny film!

The jokes were childish, and I squirmed in my seat every time a joke was delivered. It's very sad Leslie has succumbed to this kind of silly nonsense, it was an embarrassment to watch.

I hope Mr Nielsen will go back to his hilarious roots and make more funny movies like the 'Naked Gun' trilogy, and 'Spy Hard'.

I kinda watched this film in a bad mood hoping for a good laugh, Leslie Neilson always makes me laugh. Especially parody movies, since I wasn't into 2001: A Space Odessey, I thought that this was a fun looking movie that would make fun of that film. Well, it turned into something pretty bad, I really couldn't find myself laughing at any of the situations, which is sad, because I find the stupidest situations very funny and I am easily amused. But I was curious if maybe it was my bad mood that killed the comedy for me, but I looked on IMDb before watching it again and it's not just me apparently.

Well, a some what take off of the Naked Gun series, only in outer space situations, Leslie is now Dick Dix, a clumsy detective that is sent to a planet called Vegan where he learns that President Clinton has been kidnapped and cloned and that the clone is on Earth with bad intentions for the world. Or as it seems, Dick actually plants the clone by accident and well... it just wasn't funny.

The jokes tried too hard and the story was just weak, it could have been something special, but unfortunately they took too much advantage of the Naked Gun series, which was pretty sad. I know Leslie can do much better and he has, so I forgive him. For those users who are looking for a recommendation here, I'm not going to give you one because like I said, I thought it was just me that didn't like the film, but I think the rating is enough warning in itself.

3/10

For years I have been suffering Insomnia but then I got my hands on the DVD of 2001 A Space Travesty... for weeks now I have been trying to watch the movie for more than fifteen minutes but I can't... I fall asleep every time. So this movie is absolutely brilliant... as a cure for insomnia!