A notoriously unsuccessful 2002 Eddie Murphy vehicle that attempted to combine a Rat Pack-esque plot with sci-fi.
Murphy plays Pluto Nash, businessman & owner of a successful nightclub on the Moon in the year 2087. When goons from aspiring entrepreneur Rex Crater come to buy the club, Pluto refuses, forcing him to go on the run to survive and unravel the truth of who Rex Crater is and what he's planning for the moon.
The film cost an insane amount of money to make and made almost none of it back. To this day, Murphy and costar Alec Baldwin have disowned the film and it's considered one of the biggest flops in cinema.
Contains Examples Of:
- 20 Minutes into the Future: Released in 2002, set in 2087.
- Affably Evil: Rex Crater, being a clone of Pluto, is a very nice guy.
- Ambiguous Clone Ending: After all is said and done and the denouement provides Pluto and his friends a happy ending, the very last shot of the film has Pluto putting a cigar in his mouth and looking at the rest of the partygoers in a fashion that makes you wonder if the one that got shot at the climax really was "Rex".
- Artificial Gravity: Inside of the habitat domes, pretty much handwaving why they have Earth-like gravity even when the whole film happens on the Moon.
- Artistic License – Space: The film is supposed to take place in the Moon, where gravity is 1/6 of Earth's, yet they move and act as if they were on our planet's surface. Artificial gravity generators? There is a "Prepare For Full Gravity" sign on the entrance-ramp at the edge of the Domed Hometown, so technically they did try to justify it.
- Ax-Crazy: Bruno (Randy Quaid).
- Berserk Button: Pluto goes berserk on a Mook for blowing up his club, as the bar stools were made of real wood, which apparently (and quite logically) costs a small fortune to get hold of on the moon. Rex later has a similar reaction when Pluto bangs up his wooden model props.
- Breast Expansion: Played for Laughs in one scene in which Pluto messes around with the holographic projection of Dina's body in a plastic surgery clinic. While he likes the look of Dina having breasts (and ass) bigger than beach balls, she doesn't.
- Bumbling Henchman Duo: Henchmen Morgan and Kelp are quite incompetent, especially in the second half of the film.
- Car Chase: With hover-cars, on the lunar surface, ending with Pluto rocket-jumping his car over a gigantic crater to do a Try and Follow.
- Chekhov's Gun: A particularly painful example as it's critical to the entire plot of the film, in the introduction Pluto makes a blink-and-you'll-miss-it reference to having his appendix taken out in prison. The DNA from it was used to clone him and make Rex Crater.
- Chekhov's Skill: Pluto is mentioned to be a smuggler very early on and it turns out that Lunar smugglers have the Future Slang nickname of "crater-jumpers" for some reason... and then the Car Chase happens and it turns out that it's Not Hyperbole: in order to escape pursuit, Lunar smugglers rocket-jump over craters Dukes of Hazzard-style (Pluto even picked the car he stole to get to his old warehouse precisely because it's got the necessary power to pull this off)
- Co-Dragons: Belcher, who serves as Crater's head of security and advisor, and Morgan, who handles his business in the field.
- Dead All Along: Marucci was killed by Rex Crater long before the main story.
- Disney Villain Death: Rex Crater.
- Domed Hometown: Well, it is set on the Moon.
- Evil Twin: Rex Crater to Pluto.
- Exposition Dump: The film is full of these, usually taking place indoors during some mundane activity, resulting from the film's infamously
Troubled Production. - Failed Future Forecast: Hillary Clinton becoming president at some point prior to 2087 and her face being put on the dollar bills of the future (which are called "Hillaries" because of that exact detail).
- Friend on the Force: Rowland is a friend who used to be on the force (and has plenty of contacts who still are).
- Heroic Build/Amazonian Beauty: While posing as a couple to get info, Pluto and Dina go to see a body alteration specialist, who shows them different projections of what their bodies could look like. One of these is the pair as a male and female bodybuilder. Pluto, cracking a joke about Dina's bust needing work, then asks the specialist to make some adjustments, resulting in Dina being given a tune-up in the front and back.
- Human Shield/Put Down Your Gun and Step Away: Subverted in one of the better scenes:Pluto: Alright, put the guns down! Unless you wanna try and shoot around your friend here!Mook: Easier to shoot through him.Pluto and his human shield: (variations on a theme of "Oh, Crap!!")
- Large Ham: Bruno in particular, but most of the cast seem to be aware it was a pretty mediocre film and just have as much fun with the role as possible.
- The Mafia: They're the ones who paid for the cloners who made Rex Crater. Some of them also inadvertently caused Pluto to buy the club when they came after it's old owner over an unpaid debt.
- Mook Lieutenant: Morgan leads various thugs in trying to blow up Pluto's club and pursuing him afterwards.
- Mouth of Sauron: Interestingly, there are two such characters in the film. Morgan relays Rex Crater's offers to various property owners he's trying to buy out, while Belcher is the only one who sees Rex Crater, and tells Morgan and the others what to do.
- Number Two: Miguel serves as this to Pluto's club before its damaged by a bomb.
- Raygun Gothic: The general art style.
- Retired Badass: Pluto, a famous smuggler, and Rowland, a formidable detective.
- Ridiculously Human Robots: Bruno and the French Maid robot, the slot machine.
- Robot Buddy: Bruno has been this to Pluto since childhood.
- Secret-Keeper: Belcher is a villainous example, being the only one who knows just who Rex Crater is and where he came from.
- Sentry Gun: During one of the early gunfights, Pluto steals a handgun from one of Gino's mooks and shoots his way out of a bar, and then deploys a little tripod from underneath the handgun's grip and sets it on a handrail and the gun continues firing into the bar by its own as he runs like hell.
- Shoot the Builder: Rex Crater killed the doctor who cloned him (her assistant was left alive, but doesn't know that much).
- Spot the Imposter: The climax. Although the movie ends on a very vague Ambiguous Clone Ending.
- The Starscream: Rex Crater quickly proved to be this to The Mafia, killing Marucci.
- Twin Threesome Fantasy: Found the perfect woman? Just have her cloned!
- Uncle Tom Foolery: Subverted. Pluto is a rare example of a character who used to fit that trope pretty well, but grew out of it. He's also the Straight Man.
- What Happened to the Mouse?: Numerous characters, including Gino the Mobster and Pluto's business partner Miguel, are introduced only to suddenly disappear without explanation or acknowledgement from other characters. Part of this may have been due to the film's notoriously Troubled Production.
- You Have Failed Me: Morgan and Kelp get shot for being "incompetent jackasses.
