Cinema: Comedy: Big Bucks, Few Yuks

(3 of 3)

Henry began with a funny situation but no plot. So he resorted to a feeble device: the meeting of senescent civilization (the President's clan) and wily savagery (the potentates of Upper Gorm, an African nation with rich uranium deposits). When Newhart meets the Gormese, the two men cannot understand each other, which makes for five minutes of ennui. They are not the only odd couple in the film. In scene after scene, behavioral comedy attempts to engage in a dialogue with slapstick satire. But these are different comic languages, and the two forms finally fall silent in defeat. Maybe Henry should appear on TV less and watch it more. Any episode of M*A*S*H, Taxi or The Muppet Show has more laughs and pathos per minute than this impeachable farce.

—By Richard Corliss