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Bubble boy

Threat advisory: High - High risk of entertaining activities

Movie propaganda

A journey of 2755.8 miles begins with a single bounce.

Jimmy Livingstone (Jake Gyllenhaal) is a young man born without immunities and raised in a manufactured world provided by his well-intentioned, but misguided mother (Swoosie Kurtz). Jimmy is happy enough, and has all the same experiences of other boys and girls growing up... except he lives in a bubble! But when Jimmy realises he is in love with Chloe (Marley Shelton), the girl next door, he has no choice but to build a mobile bubble suit and set off across the country to Niagara Falls, to stop Chloe's wedding - which is only days away - in time to confess his love to her. Along the way, he crosses paths with freaks, bikers, rock stars and a cult, racing against the clock and his parents who are determined to bring Jimmy back to the safety of his bubble room.

Persons of interest

Jake Gyllenhaal .... Jimmy Livingston
Swoosie Kurtz .... Mrs Livingston
Marley Shelton .... Chloe
Danny Trejo .... Slim
John Carroll Lynch .... Mr Livingston
Verne Troyer .... Dr Phreak
Dave Sheridan .... Mark
Brian George .... Pushpop
Patrick Cranshaw .... Pappy/Pippy
Stephen Spinella .... Chicken Man
Ever Carradine .... Lisa
Geoffrey Arend .... Flipper Boy
Beetlejuice .... Li'l Zip
Matthew McGrory .... Human Sasquatch
Bonnie Morgan .... Rubber Woman
Jason Sklar .... Shlomo
Randy Sklar .... Dawn
Ping Wu .... Emcee
Beau Flynn .... Storywriter
Cinco Paul .... Screenwriter
Ken Daurio .... Screenwriter
Michael Kalesniko .... Screenwriter
Blair Hayes .... Director

Cinematic intelligence sources

Bubble boy trailers:

QuickTime

Studios and distributors:

Touchstone

Intelligence analyst

Special Agent Matti

Theatrical report

Laughter is the best medicine and the best laughter is to be had when laughing at people who are less fortunate than you through no fault of their own: paraplegics, quadriplegics, etc.

Nah, just kidding.

Sort of.

If you recall anything of John Travolta's early years, you will look back in fondness on The boy in the plastic bubble, a disease-of-the-week movie made when he was still in Welcome back, Kotter. It's all about a boy who lives in a bubble and wants to be normal. He also gets horny. Ain't puberty a wonderful thing?

Jake Gyllenhaal replaces John in this semi-spoof, and manages to bring an endearing quality as well as the expected sexy and funny ones. Swoosie Kurtz's lost in the 50s, over the top mother from Hell is, however, just plain annoying. It's as if Blair Hayes said, "Be as big as you can and I'll pull you back when you get too big" and then forgot to do it. Sheesh.

Jimmy's road trip adventures wobble between classic piss-take and Zany American Humour™, probably the fault of having so many writers involved (too many cooks really do spoil the broth when it comes to filmmaking). The romantic storyline is predictable and nothing more: the hero always gets the girl in spoofs, especially spoofs from Hollywood.

All up, Bubble boy is the kind of movie you expect to find hidden away on the shelves at the video shop which turns out to be ok. Good even, but not great.