Laughter Fuels ‘RocketMan’s’ Mission to Mars

What kid can’t relate to the silly, misunderstood genius Fred Randall who, at 30, is “almost a full-grown man”?

His mother still makes his favorite peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for long trips (like, say, to outer space). He can’t help breaking into Disney songs to express his emotions and responds automatically to any catastrophe with “It wasn’t me!”

Almost every kid under 12 found something to laugh at from the beginning, when Fred, as a child, is shown (to the horror of some parents in the audience) spinning himself in a clothes dryer, to the end, when the mission limps home after a series of near-disasters.

Three-year-old Jessica Bonilla of Costa Mesa started giggling at Fred’s first mishap, when he tries to qualify for the mission by making friends with the mission’s chimp passenger. He winds up in a spin with the chimp’s teeth clamped to his hand.

Most of the humor in this Disney comedy is tried and true: crash jokes, funny face jokes, kissing-an-animal jokes and jokes about gaseous bodily emissions. In this case, the smelly gas fills up a whole spacesuit, attached by a hose to the mission’s Cmdr. Billy.

Ashley Edwards, 11, and her friend Cassie Simonian, 9, both from Huntington Beach, were giggling when they left the theater. Ashley, laughing, said the gas scene was her favorite. But one kid’s fun is another’s gross-out. To Laura Bonilla, 12, “that guy was acting dorky.”

None of the kids had ever seen, or heard of, star Harland Williams. They agreed that he was indeed funny--but probably won’t be posing a threat to Jim Carrey or Robin Williams.

For some kids, the movie offered more than simple slapstick films such as “Dumb and Dumber.” While the special effects are likably cheesy, “RocketMan” still provides facts about Mars: It takes eight months to get there; it’s red, and there can be dangerous sandstorms.

Beau Bridges also has a serious role as a Houston controller still recovering from his role in the Apollo 13 snafu.

“I didn’t know they blamed someone for Apollo 13,” said Matthew Hopkins, 9, of Costa Mesa. Added his sister Lindsay, 12, “I always thought it was impossible for them to have wind on Mars because of [the lack of] atmosphere.”

She also thought the chimp was adorable in his little spacesuit.

Lindsay was also old enough to appreciate Fred’s infatuation with astronaut Julie and was impressed with how he fashioned 1940s ballroom costumes for both of them from silver and gold astronaut blankets. After a few seconds of wondering, she concluded that he managed it because “it’s a movie.”

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Parents’ perspective: Parents found the movie better than they had expected. “I loved it,” Kym Hopkins said. “I thought it was going to be stupid from the ads on TV, but I laughed from the very beginning and all the way through the whole thing. I couldn’t believe it.”

Patty Bonilla said she could relax, knowing “it didn’t have sex, it didn’t have the violence, the bad language and so forth.” She worried briefly about a bar scene in which astronauts get Fred drunk and the scene with the dryer. “It made me a little nervous, especially about [my] 3-year-old,” she said.

But Steve Wall of Costa Mesa admitted he used to swing back and forth in the dryer when he was a kid. The movie, he said, “is probably more for kids, but I have that sense of humor and enjoy it.”

* FAMILY FILMGOER, Page 14