Five movies from 1996 that would never be made today
Movies have changed a lot since the 1990s.
Even though the 20th century’s final decade really doesn’t seem like all that long ago, 1996 was 30 years ago, and since then, comedies have generally become a lot more sophisticated, while the standards for good filmmaking and special effects have come a long way.
The ‘90s saw the indie boom, with many low-budget films finding unprecedented success, like Quentin Tarantino’s stylish and violent Reservoir Dogs, while the New Queer Cinema movement gained traction, and more female filmmakers than ever were rising to prominence. There were many great Hollywood blockbusters emerging at this time, but there was certainly an increase in slightly offbeat movies that would quickly become stone-cold classics.
Yet, there were definitely a lot of movies that emerged in the ‘90s that just wouldn’t get made today, whether that be because they were too crass and used a certain type of humour nowadays considered pretty lowbrow, or because they used real animals as their leading stars. Times have changed.
So, from the orangutan movie Dunston Checks In to Eddie Murphy’s fat suit comedy The Nutty Professor, here are five movies that were made 30 years ago, but certainly wouldn’t get the green light today.
Five movies from 1996 that wouldn’t get the greenlight now:
‘Dunston Checks In’ (Ken Kwapis)
If there’s one thing that people weren’t half as bothered about in the ’90s as they are now, it’s animal rights. Back then, it wasn’t a big deal for animals to be cast alongside human actors, taken out of their natural habitat and forced to work tireless hours, exploited for no reason. Dunston Checks In saw an orangutan act opposite a child (it surely must have broken some safety and exploitation rules), and unsurprisingly, the film fared incredibly poorly.
Directed by Ken Kwapis, the movie sees the criminal orangutan fall into the hands of a new owner, a child named Kyle, although he soon wreaks havoc on the hotel he is staying in. Using a real orangutan just wouldn’t fly these days, and besides, the film would surely struggle to find an audience. It’s hardly sophisticated, and even for a children’s film, it falls flat as a forgettable comedy with bad performances to boot. I mean, Faye Dunaway was nominated for a Razzie because of the film, and for good reason.
‘The Nutty Professor’ (Tom Shadyac)
Fat suits are just not widely accepted in cinema these days, especially if they’re employed so that a character can become the butt of a joke. Yet, in The Nutty Professor, Eddie Murphy had no qualms in wearing one to play a scientist who invents a weight-loss drug so that he can secure the woman he admires. It’s so ‘90s. Murphy plays most of his family members, including his toothless grandma, and while audiences lapped it up at the time, humour has changed a lot since then, and I can’t help but feel like if it came out today, many people would not only admonish the use of fat suits, but cringe at the jokes, too.
It’s not exactly the most mature of comedies, with plenty of fart joke-type humour and obnoxious characters. Murphy’s career soon descended into critical failure, but perhaps it should’ve happened sooner when he released The Nutty Professor in 1996; it’s proper bottom-of-the-barrel comedy. Would people enjoy this if it was made today? Absolutely not, it would be straight on those ‘worst of the year’ lists.
‘Striptease’ (Andrew Bergman)
When Demi Moore’s Striptease was released, instant controversy arose from the fact that the star was given the highest amount a female actor had ever been paid in cinema history. It’s bizarre that people were so hung up on the amount Moore was paid when, really, the main issue was just how terrible everything about the film was. Moore’s character is an FBI agent turned stripper, and she appears fully naked on the poster, save for some modestly placed arms and legs.
With sexist marketing, poor performances, and a bizarre use of tone, what was the film trying to say? Striptease was an absolute failure, and it destroyed Moore’s career for many years. If a male-directed movie were so blatantly trying to cash in on its female star’s body to the extent that if it were released today, there would be instant outrage. It’s much better left in the past.
‘Bio-Dome’ (Jason Bloom)
When you look at a cast list and see names like Pauly Shore and Kylie Minogue, you know you’re not in for a cinematic masterpiece (sorry, Kylie). Bio-Dome is often labelled one of the worst movies ever made, and it’s no surprise, because it’s full of innuendos, toilet humour, and terrible acting. Somehow, $8.5million was secured to make this terrible film, which was critically derided on every level. The fact that this film marks the first onscreen appearance of the God-awful Tenacious D only adds fuel to the fire.
With such a hollow concept of two slackers getting stuck in a closed ecological system, which is set to be sealed for five years, you just know that if it were made today, it would go straight to Netflix, maybe not even a streaming service as prestigious as that, and be instantly laughed at and forgotten. It’s truly awful.
‘Ed’ (Bill Couturié)
1996 didn’t just give us one ape film in the form of Dunston Checks In, but that same year, we also got Ed, which is somehow even worse. This time, it appears that the chimp was a mixture of animatronics and actors in costume, with the titular primate getting himself into all kinds of crazy stunts, whether that be flying across the air or playing baseball. The film starred Friends’ Matt LeBlanc as a man who scores a place on a minor league baseball team, and it’s here that he befriends a chimpanzee, who somehow becomes his roommate.
The whole concept is ridiculous, and you just can’t imagine a movie so stupid being made today. With a foolish, unbelievable premise, you’d think that there might be enough of a surreal element to make the film a little more worthwhile, but it’s just plain awful. I can’t imagine any studio funnelling the slightest bit of money into a project like this these days; I’m certain that absolutely no one would watch it.
