Harriet Deltubbo
If you're a film collector, there are always a few films from your childhood you've been looking for for years. MO' MONEY was the last on my bucket list. It just became available at Blockbuster. I hadn't known the name of the film or its stars. Fortunately, I found it listed in the Forgotten Comedies book and would occasionally search for it on the net. The film is a cheap one that rises above these restrictions to produce a nice comedy. The major players are excellent. The comedy elements are unfortunate as they usually are in films like these, but I never forgot the Wayans sightings. Overall, I give it seven out of ten stars.
Michael Neumann
The title of this crass, predictable (even by Hollywood standards) comedy of course represents the goal of every commercial feature, but it's hard to find praise for a film that panders so shamelessly to the worst instincts of undiscriminating moviegoers. Responsibility for this mess belongs to TV personality Daman Wayans, who wrote the follow-the-dots screenplay and stars as a happy-go-lucky con artist caught up in the high-tech dirty dealings of a big financial corporation. The major problem: Wayans portrays himself as a quasi-Eddie Murphy smart-alec who can never, ever be the butt of a joke. His character is smug, superior, and selfish in a way meant to be attractive, charming, and funny, and except for girlfriend Stacey Dash everyone else is stupid, eccentric, psychopathic, or suffering from some physical disability (also meant go be amusing). Equal discredit goes to hack director Peter MacDonald, the auteur responsible for 'Rambo III' and 'Tango & Cash'.
squeezebox
MO' MONEY might have possibly been able to get away with its mean-spirited, homophobic and tasteless atmosphere if it were witty or clever or perhaps even funny. But it is none of the above. It's a moronic, nasty comedy by a moronic, nasty comedian who wants to drag everyone but himself through the mud.Damon Wayans is one of those comedians who will tell a joke at anyone's expense but his own. His arrogance and meanness is palpable through every moment of this brutally unfunny comedy (which he wrote). He takes a potentially solid story and wastes it as nothing more than a vanity project for himself. As for the humor, he sticks to lampooning handicapped people and homosexuals (especially those with AIDS, which he seems to think is a real laugh riot).His performance is also unbearable. Apparently wanting to show a slightly more serious side of his persona, he does this by playing every scene with the same blank expression on his face, except for a few moments when he feels the need to mug it up with his smug, self-indulgent smirk.The other Wayans brothers have proved themselves willing to be the butt of their own jokes. It was once said the first person a good comedian has to be able to laugh at is himself. If Damon Wayans ever learned that lesson, it was definitely after he made MO' MONEY.
Tito-8
Although thin on plot, great performances by the leads do manage to save what would otherwise be another mediocre comedy. Damon Wayans shows considerable charisma as the lead, and has terrific chemistry with beautiful co-star Stacey Dash. To be sure, much of the humour here is silly, but when the pace is slower (and the dialogue is realistic), the film really does work .
AD
