accessAtlanta

Grade: D+

Verdict: All the laughs are in the movie trailer

Details: Starring Orlando Jones and Eddie Griffin. Rated PG-13 for violence and profanity. One hour, 33 minutes.

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Review:

Odd, isn't it, that just when “Traffic” is out and making millions, along comes a comedy windbag called “Double Take” involving drugs, money laundering and life on both sides of the U.S.-Mexico border.

By now you must have seen the trailer for “Double Take.” It runs about every two minutes on television, thrusting that weasel-thin comic Eddie Griffin right at you, making fun of nuns (“There's a first time for e-ver'-thing!”) and verbally slamming aggressive cops (“Do I look like Puffy?!”).

The trailer's sort of funny. And, truth be told, contains every single ounce of life wrung out of a 93-minute flick.

If “Big Momma's House” made you belly-laugh, “Double Take” won't. If “Scary Movie” gave you convulsions, “Double Take” won't. If “The Nutty Professor” left you delirious, “Double Take” . . .  heck, you know the drill.

A lot of the trouble with “Double Take” is the story's twists and turns. The tale is mostly lifted from a 1957 drama with Rod Steiger called “Across the Bridge,” based on a Graham Greene story about multiple mistaken identities and a dog. “Bridge” was a serious thriller that somehow made a few Hollywood types laugh. So they wrote “Double Take,” a convoluted tale about a decent, earnest, big-time banker named Daryl Chase (Orlando Jones), who, in a Cary Grant “North by Northwest” kind of way, becomes hunted after a mishmash of drug-money laundering, murder and weird double crosses.

Griffin plays Freddy Tiffany, the mysterious guy who keeps popping up before and after Chase is on the lam. Is Freddy a streetwise wiseguy? An FBI agent? A murderer? A thief?

Most of “Double Take's” supposed charm is that Freddy may not be who he seems. And why should he? Nobody else in this movie is, either. With nearly a dozen folks backstabbing and tricking each other every few minutes, the film's little surprises pretty quickly become the movie's big irritations.

Most every gag goes on too long. And even though Griffin does a fine Sammy Davis Jr. impression, many of the jokes just sort of fall flat. Like this one: “Get on before you get spit on!”

Actually, that's what we all ought to say to “Double Take.”

— Bob Longino, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution