Browse: Home / The Nutty Professor (Year Of The Month)

Menu

Skip to content
  • Home
  • Who We Are
  • About
  • Privacy
  • Contact Us
  • Login

The-SoluteLogo

A Film Site By Lovers of Film

Menu

Skip to content
  • Features
  • Reviews
  • Long Reviews
  • News
  • Articles and Opinions
  • Other Media
  • Disney Byways: Non-Disney Properties on Disney+
  • The Friday Article Roundup: Writer's Blocks
  • Lunch Links: MOOMIN
  • Film on the Internet: BASKET CASE
  • New on DVD and Blu-Ray

The Nutty Professor (Year Of The Month)

Posted By Tristan "Drunk Napoleon" Nankervis on January 30, 2023 in Features, Short Articles | Leave a response

It’s always fun to dive into something that clearly influenced something you love. The Nutty Professor is very clearly the inspiration for Professor Frink on The Simpsons; in retrospect, the gag where Frink drank Grampa’s sex drug and suddenly talked like a New York wise guy is clarified for me. But I also see influence on the show’s sense of humour. The Nutty Professor is not a very good movie, and it’s bad in the way most American comedy films from the Sixties are; it’s mostly plotless, scenes drag on long past their point being made, and the dialogue isn’t so much a witty back-and-forth and escalation of punchlines as it is the vague idea of a thing having happened. It’s also bad in the sense that there are about a half-dozen actors but maybe two and a half characters in the whole film; this is almost neurotically focused on Julian Kelp and his alter-ego Buddy Love, and neither character is particularly interesting. I’ll cruelly suggest that the paucity of ideas driving this film come from Jerry Lewis having a complete lack of interest in the world at that time.

And yet, I can see how The Simpsons took ideas and potential from this and refined it into something better. There are moments where The Nutty Professor seems to come alive and spark into something funny; despite it going on too long, I enjoy the POV sequence of Buddy walking into the Purple Room before cutting to him – admittedly, partly because of the unintentional comedy of all that build-up leading to just some guy in a loud suit. The central notion of a shy guy bringing out his suppressed instincts is a compelling one – it is, after all, a riff on The Strange Case Of Dr Jekyll & Mr Hyde – and Lewis’s performance is great, not just creating two entirely different caricatures but subtly shifting between them. I feel as if the whole movie got crushed into a few jokes on shows I like better.

Posted in Features, Short Articles | Tagged Jerry Lewis, the nutty professor

About the Author

tristan.jay.nankervis@gmail.com'

Tristan “Drunk Napoleon” Nankervis

Related Posts

Missing imageYear of the Month in Comics: June 1964→

Dissolve On (8/20/2017-8/26/2017)→

Missing imageYear of the Month in Comics: October 1957→

The Scorsese Experience: The King of Comedy→

  • Comments
  • Popular
  • Most Recent
  • j*****@yahoo.com'
    mr_apollo on Year of the Month: Mon OncleWonderful piece, Sam. It's made…
  • j*****@yahoo.com'
    mr_apollo on Year of the Month: Mon OncleFellow heretic here. I've never…
  • n***********@gmail.com'
    Ruck Cohlchez on Film on the Internet: AN AMERICAN CRIMEI wouldn't have called it…
  • j***********@gmail.com'
    Son of Griff on LIFE ITSELFGlad to hear back from…
  • n*********@gmail.com'
    Jake Gittes on Film on the Internet: AN AMERICAN CRIMEThis is the single most…
  • “The End” of SAVAGES

    33861 views / Posted November 10, 2014
  • What the fuck did I just watch? SPHERE

    27453 views / Posted March 19, 2015
  • The Untalented Mr. Ripley: The Craft of Standup Comedy and the Non-Comedy of TOM MYERS

    25068 views / Posted June 26, 2018
  • Scenic Routes: SHOWGIRLS (1995)

    20099 views / Posted November 20, 2014
  • Yvonne, or: CASABLANCA In One Character and Three Scenes

    11142 views / Posted August 21, 2014
  • My face on seeing the "recently added"

    Disney Byways: Non-Disney Properties on Disney+

    March 24, 2023 / Gillianren
  • Oh, to have the straight line just hovering over your shoulder for when you need it.

    The Friday Article Roundup: Writer’s Blocks

    March 24, 2023 / The Ploughman
  • This was a tough one to find a properly formatted header image for.

    Lunch Links: MOOMIN

    March 23, 2023 / The Ploughman
  • Film on the Internet: BASKET CASE

    March 22, 2023 / ZoeZ
  • New on DVD and Blu-Ray

    March 21, 2023 / Greta Taylor

Last Tweets

  • Disney Byways: Non-Disney Properties on Disney+ - https://t.co/NNBet9OWrd, 12 hours ago
  • The Friday Article Roundup: Writer’s Blocks - https://t.co/3a4Sy0roVA, 24 hours ago
  • The witty and bittersweet short film MOOMIN doesn't require a smartphone to watch, but it helps. https://t.co/gMMYZWtxgb, Mar 23

©2014 - 2016 The-Solute | Hosted, Developed and Maintained by Bellingham WP LogoBellinghamWP.com.

Menu

  • Home
  • Who We Are
  • About
  • Privacy
  • Contact Us
  • Login
Do NOT follow this link or you will be banned from the site!