Change Your Image
burnmps
Reviews
Nothing But Trouble (1991)
Unconventional Comedy That Gets A Bad Wrap
I look up all of the movies I watch on IMDb, and I'm surprised that this one is so disliked. I think the main reason is that with a cast of such comedy legends as Chevy Chase, Dan Aykroyd and John Candy, people were expecting a more conventional comedy. Most of their audience was probably expecting something along of the lines of "The Couch Trip", "Delirious" or "Fletch". I think people like me, who appreciate campy horror films like "2001 Maniacs", "The Butcher" and any of the "Texas Chainsaw Massacre" series, are more likely to find some humor in this film.
Thanks to the remarkably bland title, I had no idea that this was a comedy with a horror twist when I found it on a cable channel. The completely pointless start of the film, which involves a party and some sort of talk of some sort of business deal, also doesn't hint at what the film is really about. It isn't until the protagonists get arrested that all of the fun starts.
What follows is something in between comedy and horror. It skews more towards horror, with tons of gross-out scenes thanks to Dan Aykroyd's various grotesque characters. There are tons of bones, but not a lot of blood. Unlike conventional horror movies, where body-counts are generally in the double digits, only one group of ne'er-do-wells end up slaughtered over the course of the film. Even the two annoying ancillary characters who are along for the ride, who would be dead meat in any real horror film, end up getting a reprieve and a happy ending.
By far the strangest part, and my personal favorite, is the musical performance in the middle of the film. When I saw a limo pulling up in a scene halfway through the film, I thought, okay here come some more victims. I was surprised to say the least that the occupants of the vehicle turned out to be the entire Digital Underground crew, including the instantly recognizable Shock G (aka Humpty Hump)! Instead of being murdered, they all perform a song (unfortunately not their one major hit, the far superior "Humpty Hump"). You can even see the late-great Tupac Shakur as one of the members of Digital Underground, before he started his solo career. I would recommend this film to anyone just for this surreal moment, but if you have no idea who Tupac or Digital Underground are then you probably won't enjoy it as much.
After a few fake endings and the actual goofy cartoon ending, the movie is over. All in all, it doesn't have that many laughs, and it's definitely not scary, but it is rarely boring. The Digital Underground cameo is excellent and the cast plays their roles well. This is certainly not the best movie I've seen, but I would rank it better than any bad comedy and most bad horror movies. In fact, I'd say this film is just a few buckets of blood and a few crazy gross-out scenes away from a cult classic.