Click here for the flashback interview with Will Forte for EXTRA ORDINARY.
The dynamic tension of Wile E. Coyote’s endless quest to capture the Road Runner has always arisen from the Herculean industriousness of the former, and the flippant impudence of the former. The Road Runner didn’t just avoid becoming an entrée, he would rub in it with a deadpan expression and a beep-beep just as Coyote realized his latest scheme either failed, was foiled, or both. It’s not that bloodthirsty carton viewers wanted to see Road Runner meet a culinary end, it was always that Coyote never gave up, was so very ingenious with his gadgets from the Acme Corporation, so breathtakingly fearless in using them, and was so visibly crushed, sometimes literally, as he watched the Road Runner skedaddle down the desert highway in a plume of dust. Neither spoke a word, but the genius animators of Looney Tunes knew just how trace the line of a shoulder slump and the squint of a mournful eye such that we would look upon this forlorn soul and feel a wealth of empathy. Nor gaze upon the perky upturned beak and mischievous of the bird without feeling that maybe, just maybe, he needed to be taken down a notch for enjoying his escapes so much. In case we need a refresher on any of those doomed plans, there is a tidy montage at the start of COYOTE VS. ACME to remind us why it was endlessly entertaining while also, unaccountably, tugging at our heartstrings.
Not that such empathy ever stopped us from laughing. And the same holds true with COYOTE VS. ACME, which resurrects these adversaries in a feature-length adventure with all the zing and pizzaz of the original shorts, and the sly, dry wit that roundly refutes the nihilism of the near-impossible. For the update, our characters remain true to form, but they now live in a reality with live-action humans that expands the scope without losing the classic subversive humor.
And it is to this human world that Coyote turns, venturing forth from the desert and into Albuquerque seeking justice by means of Kevin Avery (Will Forte). He’s a personal injury attorney specializing in small-time lawsuits against the Acme Corporation when their cartoon products hurt the cartoon for which they were designed and then settling. Quickly. A man who long ago burnt out on the stress of dreaming big, he wants to pass that wisdom on to his niece, Paige (Lana Condor), a budding lawyer who dreams of using her Oxford education to make a difference in the world. Where Kevin sees a quick pay-off, Paige sees turning the tables on a big and negligent corporation. Little does she realize that this is more than negligence. There are dark reasons for all those schemes backfiring on Coyote, even if he was spectacularly foolhardy and pushed good sense aside in favor of dining on poultry when using them.
Forte is ideal casting for the defeated everyman suddenly thrust into the maelstrom. His laconic irony is the perfect foil for Coyote’s wordless but compelling zeal for justice. The new animators haven’t missed a beat in turning that canine face and body into an endless variety of expressions that capture the smallest nuance of what Coyote is trying to get across wordlessly to his legal counsel. From rage to frustration to hope, it is a visual feast of kinetic energy paired with crack timing. As Acme’s, ahem, crack in-house lawyer, John Cena is a study in arrogant condescension, lording it over Kevin with extreme prejudice. All he needs is a mustache to twirl. Instead, he has a bolo tie the size of a hubcap that begs for psychological profiling.
The best part of COYOTE VS. ACME isn’t the new products introduced, including lion in a can or dehydrated boulder. Rather, it’s how it chooses to expand the original one-joke premise while paying tribute to the Looney Tunes universe with cameos on which the plot actually hingse. And lest we forget, full kudos to the voice artists, including Jeff Bergman, Tucker Hawkey and Eric Bauza, who pay tribute to Mel Blanc and company with voice work that makes us believe Mr. Blanc has returned for one more performance. Without them, none of this would have worked. What starts as a clever bit of nostalgia brought into the present surprises by taking a Capra-esque turn. Still funny, but with real-world stakes featuring high-brow issues lurking beneath some wickedly low-brow humor.
Your Thoughts?