Watch: Down to Earth 2001 123movies, Full Movie Online – It seems everyone is trying to get into heaven; at least those whose time is up. For Lance Barton (Chris Rock), a struggling comedian and bicycle messenger, it’s the last thing on his mind. His due date in heaven is fifty years away. In the meantime, he has big dreams to pursue on Earth, such as landing a slot at the final Amateur Night Contest at the famed Apollo Theatre. Lance’s has one little problem though – he isn’t that funny. Thanks to an overly cautious emissary from heaven, Mr. Keyes (Eugene Levy), he’s going to get hit (literally) with a much bigger problem. Showing that even God has difficulty finding good help these days, the inept minion mistakenly plucks Lance from a traffic accident – before it takes place. Transporting him to the Pearly Gates, or more accurately, the velvet roped-lines of the hottest club around, the error is finally addressed by Mr. King (Chazz Palminteri), the streetwise, no-nonsense head angel who manages the place from his plush windowed office. Since returning to his own body on Earth is impossible, the urban dwelling Lance reluctantly agrees to a normally unthinkable proposal. He’ll occupy the body of a wealthy old white mogul, Charles Wellington III (Brian Rhodes), until a more suitable body can be found. Strangely enough, in a Park Avenue penthouse, servants and butlers become his new homeys as Lance works on his streetwise comedy routine for the big Apollo showdown. Living in the body of a callous old white man would be bizarre enough for Lance without falling in love with Sontee Jenkins (Regina King), the beautiful woman publicly battling Wellington’s company at the same time. And if that wasn’t enough, he has to deal with the love affair between Wellington’s wife and his personal assistant, and their plot to have him killed..
Plot: Struggling comic Lance Barton knows what it’s like to die on stage. But when his life takes an unexpected turn – straight to heaven – Lance is sure there’s been a mistake. Miraculously, he’s right! An angel tells Lance he was taken prematurely but assures him he can be returned to Earth – in the aged body of a ruthless white billionaire. In this improbable reincarnation, Lance begins a hilarious quest to realize his showbiz dream…and, along the way, discovers the person he never imagined he could be. Chris Rock delivers a first-rate performance in this romantic comedy remake of HEAVEN CAN WAIT.
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Rock rolls
Chris Rock stars in this remake of Warren Beatty’s Heaven Can Wait (itself a remake of the 1941 film Here Comes Mr. Jordan), a comedy about a man who dies before his time, before he can realize his dreams, and his adventures in his new (albeit temporary) body. In the Beatty version, the protagonist was a backup quarterback for the then-Los Angeles Rams. In Rock’s hipper version, our lead character is a struggling young – and decidedly low-talent – standup comedian.It’s very funny to see the razor-sharp Rock playing a bad comedian. It’s kind of like seeing Tom Hanks play a bad actor. Lance Barton’s dream is to play the legendary Apollo Theater on a non-amateur night. But every time he tries out his material, he’s booed off the stage lustily – so much so that his nickname becomes “Booie.” His jokes are lame, his delivery painful. In short, Lance is everything that the real Chris Rock isn’t.
Lance is also a bike messenger, and he’s riding the streets on his way to try out even more material when BAM! He’s hit by a truck. Ok, so maybe he was taken from his body a tenth of a second early by a slightly incompetent angel (Eugene Levy), but hey, he was going to get hit anyway. No dice, it appears Lance isn’t due in Heaven until 2044. So what to do? Mr. King (Chazz Palminteri), the “manager” of Heaven, reluctantly agrees to find a new body for the not-quite-dead Mr. Barton. Trouble is, the body they find is of a greedy, old white man. Turns out this fella (a Mr. Wellington) owns all kinds of things – he’s the 15th richest man in the country! What luck! You can imagine how Lance will turn things around.
But of course, while in the body of the affluent Mr. Wellington, Lance falls for a gorgeous hospital worker (Regina King). We males know how tough it is to find a female given our own body, but try winning one over while you’re an dumpy, old white guy! And it’s even worse when she’s not impressed by your money.
This is Rock’s first shot at a lead role, and in my opinion he performs admirably. There’s still a lot of the standup comedian in him – and, of course, if he ever wants to get diverse roles, he might have to stop incorporating standup routines into the script – but this isn’t really a bad thing. Rock’s personality – his drive, his delivery, his demeanor, and his passion – are what fuel this film. He’s clearly having a lot of fun in the role, and he seems bent on making sure you have fun watching him.
Chris Rock deserves better than he gives himself in “Down To Earth”
Chris Rock deserves better than he gives himself in “Down To Earth.” As directed by brothers Chris & Paul Weitz of “American Pie” fame, this uninspired remake of Warren Beatty’s 1978 fantasy “Heaven Can Wait,” itself a rehash of 1941’s “Here Comes Mr. Jordan,” lacks the abrasively profane humor that won Chris Rock an Emmy for his first HBO special. Predictably, he spouts swear words from A to Z, but he consciously avoids the F-word. Anybody who saw this gifted African-American comic in “Lethal Weapon 4,” “Dogma,” or “Nurse Betty” knows he can elicit more laughter with the F-word than Martin Lawrence and Eddie Murphy put together. Sadly, despite a few witty one-liners, “Down To Earth” hits Rock bottom both as a contrived comedy and an improbable interracial romance.“Down to Earth” utterly destroys any good will that the Weitz Brothers generated with their landmark gross-out face “American Pie.” This disposable drivel qualifies as a contrived as well as confusing comedy with a thoroughly improbable color-blind interracial romance. Unfortunately, a more than competent castamong them “The Full Monty’s” Mark Addy, Chazz Palminteri of “Analyze This,” “SCTV’s” Eugene Levy, and newcomer Brian Rhodes as Charles Wellington, Jr.are wasted in flat-footed, sketchy roles. Hardcore Rock fans will undoubtedly accuse their favorite comedian with trying to fix something that was never broken. Abysmally written by Lance Crouther, Ali Le Roi, Louis CK, and Rock, “Down To Earth” casts Chris as a messenger who rides a bike by day in the Big Apple and gets booed off the stage at night in Harlem’s celebrated Apollo Theatre. Poor Lance Barton (Chris Rock) suffers from severe stage fright. Nevertheless, his charitable manager Whitney Daniels (Frankie Faison of “Hannibal”) sticks with him through thick and thin. After Lance learns the Apollo Theatre will hold one final amateur night extravaganza, he implores Whitney to get him in the line-up. Excuse me, but if Lance is such a deadbeat stand-up comic, why does the Apollo keep inviting him back? Meanwhile, fate has something else in store for Lance. While pedaling home on his bike, our protagonist spots a pretty lady, Sontee (Regina King of “Jerry Maguire”), crossing the street, but he doesn’t see the bus that collides with him and kills him. Wham! Lance Barton levitates skyward with a halo wreathed around his head. In Heaven, which resembles a cruise ship nightclub, Lance learns that an overzealous angel, Mr. Keyes (Eugene Levy of “Stay Tuned”), timed his death 40 years ahead of schedule.
Heavenly honcho Mr. King (Chazz Palminteri of “Analyze This”), God’s right-hand guy, apologizes and escorts Lance back to earth. The snag is Lance cannot reclaim his corpse, so he must inhabit another body. The best that Mr. Keyes can come up with is ruthless, white, 60-year old tycoon Charles Wellington. Wellington’s adulterous wife Amber (Jennifer Coolidge of “American Pie”) and his unscrupulous personal aide Winston (Greg Germann of “Sweet November”) have just tried to poison him. Reluctantly, before Wellington’s body vanishes, Lance accepts it conditionally as a loaner until Keyes can locate a more appropriate body. Meanwhile, Lance-as-Wellington encounters Sontee again. She is a nurse activist protesting his decision to privatize a Brooklyn community hospital that serves the poor. While Regina King brings a surfeit of charisma to her role as a crusading health care worker, she plays a character who bypasses credible motivation in her affairs with Wellington. Although he is no longer black, Lance not only tries to woo Sontee but also win a gig at the Apollo.
“Down To Earth” features Rock in his most unfunny role. The comedian’s reason for making this movie seems questionable. Reportedly, he ate lunch with Warren Beatty and told Beatty that he loved the original script that scenarist Elaine May had penned for Beatty. Initially, Beatty tried the race-reversal gimmick himself in his own version by trying to cast Muhammad Ali in the title role of “Heaven Can Wait.” The deal fell through, and Beatty headlined the movie himself. According to Rock, his longtime co-writers and he thought that they could ‘annihilate’ this classic. Moreover, he justified his choice of “Heaven Can Wait” based on his philosophy to “Do Something you can only do when you’re hot.” Earlier, Rock rejected a script about a busload of touring rappers, because he saw little opportunity to stretch his image in such an outing. As a lifeless comedian in “Down to Earth,” Rock doesn’t so much stretch his image as he inverts it for the worst! This half-baked concert film with an annoying plot does as much to cremate his comic reputation as it does the Weitz Brothers! You know a film about a comedian is in dire straits when a scene at the nightclub is played so you cannot hear the jokes, only the laughter. Similarly, the casting of Mark Addy as Wellington’s butler who speaks the Queen’s English but is in reality a commoner from Michigan defies logic, too. Addy is an actual Englishman, and he doesn’t have to fake an accent; his accent is genuine. The major overriding quandary with “Down to Earth” is the on-again-off-again, look-a-like switcheroo that the characters make so Chris Rock doesn’t disappear completely from the sight for more than a few seconds. Although Chris spends half the movie as white guy Wellington, audiences see him largely as Lance, undercutting the comic irony of watching his stocky, bald-headed, Caucasian white, alter-ego perform ghetto humor and chant derogatory hip-hop lyrics. Incredibly, Rock served double-duty as the film’s executive producer and one of its four scribes. The mystery is how such a wealth of talent could grind out such an awkward, misguided muddle of a comedy. About the only redeeming feature of “Down to Earth” is Jamshied Sharifi’s superb orchestral film score.
Original Language en
Runtime 1 hr 27 min (87 min)
Budget 49000000
Revenue 71186502
Status Released
Rated PG-13
Genre Comedy, Fantasy
Director Chris Weitz, Paul Weitz
Writer Elaine May, Warren Beatty, Chris Rock
Actors Chris Rock, Regina King, Chazz Palminteri
Country Germany, Canada, Australia, United States
Awards 3 nominations
Production Company N/A
Website N/A
Sound Mix DTS, Dolby Digital
Aspect Ratio 1.85 : 1
Camera Panavision Panaflex Gold II, Panavision Super Speed MKII and Ultra Speed MKII Lenses
Laboratory DeLuxe, Hollywood (CA), USA (prints), DeLuxe, Toronto, Canada (dailies), Technicolor, New York (NY), USA (dailies)
Film Length 2,452 m (Spain)
Negative Format 35 mm (Kodak Vision 320T 5277)
Cinematographic Process Spherical
Printed Film Format 35 mm (Kodak Vision 2383)