MOVIE REVIEWS : Short’s Comedic Genius Can’t Carry ‘Pure Luck’

If ever anyone was born under a bad sign, effervescent accountant Eugene Proctor is that man. Hit by lightning twice (once inside a movie theater), Proctor is the kind of guy who gets his checked luggage mangled before his plane even takes off. If he rides in an elevator with a pregnant woman, the apparatus is sure to get stuck and the woman destined to go into labor. Immediately. He is an accident that never has to wait very long to happen.

Martin Short plays Proctor in the new comedy “Pure Luck” (citywide) and there is a certain poetic irony in that fact. For though Short is without doubt one of the most convulsively funny comics working in Hollywood, his career has been similarly snakebit. His performances, such as the pathologically wily agent in “The Big Picture,” often have the touch of genius about them, but they almost always come in films that are more or less forgettable. And this latest, worse luck, is not an exception to that rule.

Based on “Le Chevre,” a French farce written and directed by the dauntingly prolific Francis Veber (“La Cage aux Folles,” “The Tall Blond Man With One Black Shoe,” among many others), “Pure Luck” doesn’t expose us to the hapless Mr. Proctor right away.

First off we meet the similarly accident-prone Valerie Highsmith (Sheila Kelley). Daughter of fabulously wealthy insurance magnate George Highsmith (Sam Wanamaker), she foolishly goes off on an unescorted vacation to Mexico and, after surviving a number of harrowing accidents, suddenly disappears off the face of the Earth.

Enter now company psychologist Dr. Monosoff (the invariably funny Harry Shearer), a man with a plan. The world’s reigning expert (in fact the world’s only expert) in “coincident misfortune syndrome,” Monosoff tells the tycoon that what is needed to find his daughter is someone who is similarly afflicted, someone who is fated to make the same klutzy mistakes she did and thus stumble on her in a way that a more logical mind could never duplicate. Someone named Eugene Proctor.

Highsmith, obviously in desperation, agrees to send Proctor to Mexico, but only if he is in the care of a more traditional, hard-boiled detective, Raymond Campanella (Danny Glover). In order for Eugene to work at peak inefficiency, however, he has to believe he is in charge, and Campanella, as desperate as his boss, agrees to this ruse.

As the extravagantly delusional Proctor (“I was never cut out to be an accountant,” he says with knowing bravado when he gets the assignment), Martin Short is little short of wonderful. Playing a rogue choirboy with a goofy grin and an unstoppable eagerness to please, Short brings a buoyant, gleeful enthusiasm to every line of dialogue and situation he has to deal with.

And when it comes to the pratfall department, to the silly business of walking into walls and falling face forward into open ditches, Short has no peer. Maybe its the heedless zest with which he throws himself into these stunts, or the eager resilience with which he bounces back from each fiasco, but Short has the gift of making you laugh at cliched situations as if no one had ever even thought of them before.

The rest of the production, however, is not so blessed. Clearly this is a one-joke movie, and though some variations of it are quite funny, the dead spots far outnumber the bright ones. Working from a script by Herschel Weingrod and Timothy Harris (“Kindergarten Cop,” “Twins”), Australian director Nadia Tass, who created something of a stir with her debut film, “Malcolm,” a few years back, unfortunately seems more lethargic than inspired here.

While Short has no trouble rising above any kind of situation, Glover is not as fortunate. His Campanella is the film’s straight man, his job little more than to look exasperated and whine every time Proctor does something outrageous, a scenario that is every bit as repetitious as it sounds. And anyone who’s seen “To Sleep With Anger” knows what a small fraction of Glover’s talent a role like that calls on.

Finally, then, this is Short’s picture, and though he can do no wrong in it, he is not in a position to carry the whole thing. His fans will dutifully trek to it, laughing at his skill and wondering when Hollywood will finally do him justice. It’s a hell of a good question.

‘Pure Luck’

Martin Short: Proctor

Danny Glover: Campanella

Sheila Kelley: Valerie

Sam Wanamaker: Highsmith

Scott Wilson: Grimes

Harry Shearer: Monosoff

A Sean Daniel Co. production, released by Universal. Director Nadia Tass. Producers Lance Hool and Sean Daniel. Executive producer Frances Veber. Screenplay Herschel Weingrod & Timothy Harris. Cinematographer David Parker. Editor Billy Weber. Music Jonathan Sheffer. Production design Peter Wooley. Art director Hector Romero Jr. Set designer Arturo Brito. Running time: 1 hour, 36 minutes.

MPAA-rated PG.