By Robert Scucci
| Published
I can’t think of any other two actors who chew scenery with more verve and pizzazz than Nicolas Cage and Samuel L. Jackson. Also, if you’ve been reading any of my reviews for any amount of time, you know how many blind spots I have when it comes to my media consumption habits. I don’t read other people’s reviews, I don’t subscribe to other entertainment news sites, and I generally don’t care about any of the hot goss Hollywood has to offer. I watch movies in a vacuum, and in most cases, I just click on whatever title crosses my path and give it a go.
That is all to say I am a Nicolas Cage superfan, and off the top of my head, I can’t really name a Samuel L. Jackson performance that I didn’t like. So you can only imagine how thrilled I was when I stumbled upon 1993’s Amos & Andrew, a film led by both of these magnetic personalities that somehow managed to garner a 17 percent critical score on Rotten Tomatoes despite being a pretty solid comedy of errors.
Amos & Andrew isn’t a perfect movie. Far from it. But it’s Nicolas Freakin’ Cage and Samuel L. Freakin’ Jackson doing what they do best. If you’re a fan of either actor, or both, then at the very least, it’s another box to check off if you haven’t already, and you won’t be disappointed if you know how to have fun.
Good Old Fashioned Family Racism
Amos & Andrew has a painfully simple and stupid plot, and I mean stupid as a compliment of the highest order. Samuel L. Jackson plays Andrew Sterling, a Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright who’s just getting settled into his new island vacation home. When his neighbors Phil (Michael Lerner) and Judy Gillman (Margaret Colin) witness him setting up his stereo, completely unaware that their old neighbors moved out, they assume that he’s broken into the house and is stealing everything because he’s Black.
They call the cops, which brings Police Chief Cecil Tolliver (Dabney Coleman) to the scene, who then calls for an obscene number of reinforcements after the Gillmans unknowingly make it sound like Andrew may be holding them hostage. When an officer accidentally triggers Andrew’s car alarm, he exits the house, not knowing he’s surrounded, and his key fob is mistaken for a 9mm handgun, prompting the officers to open fire on his house.
After learning the reality of the situation, Cecil, who’s up for reelection, realizes that he needs to save face quickly if he wants to keep his job. Andrew, still not knowing that he’s surrounded by police and operating under the assumption that somebody’s trying to rob or kill him, lays low while Cecil recruits Amos Odell (Nicolas Cage), a petty criminal who’s the perfect patsy.
The arrangement Cecil makes with Amos is simple: if he can break into Andrew’s house, act like he’s the gunman, and surrender, then Cecil can save his reputation, and he’ll let Amos walk free for helping him out. Immediately, Amos decides that this is the perfect time to ask for a million dollars and a helicopter.
Meanwhile, the SWAT team and reporters surround the place, not knowing that Amos and Andrew have since relocated to the Gillman residence, where they plan to steal a car and skip town until everything blows over.
So Stupid, It Just Works
Roger Ebert gave Amos & Andrew two out of four stars, stating that the film needs to “be more innocent about race in America, or less.” His main beef with the film is that the whole movie is a comedy of errors about how systemic racism is a real problem that needs to be talked about, but it never truly gets its point across because it’s trying too hard to be silly, especially by the third act.
As a straight-up comedy that has a racial component simmering in the background, Amos & Andrew is beyond solid. It’s not an award winner by any stretch of the imagination, but the chemistry between Cage and Jackson’s characters, especially as they get to know each other, is worth the price of admission alone. And it’s always fun to watch a corrupt or stupid (or both) officer of the law get his ass totally handed to him as each misguided decision he makes, of which there are plenty, epically backfires.
Amos & Andrew is far from high art, but it’s a great odd-couple kind of flick that’s pretty low stakes at the end of the day. The Gillmans are picture-perfect NIMBY neighbors you love to hate, and when their behind-closed-doors activities and true personalities are exposed by our heroes, it’s incredibly satisfying to watch. If you can appreciate the film for what it is, and you’re a fan of the talent involved, you’ll have a great time watching Cage and Jackson butt heads, become friends, and go their separate ways when all is said and done.
As of this writing, you can stream Amos & Andrew for free on Tubi.
