Clifford (1994)

Horrible plot horrible script I mean a 40 yr old man playing a kid...,,,, But yet short somehow makes this work it's a light hearted comedy that I found Rather enjoyable you need to not be so uptight and just be like what the hell To enjoy this movie if you can't do that if you take yourself to seriously you won't like it And you be like a few reviewers on here and hate on the movie Be warned it is normal to loathe the character of Clifford Your either gonna love the character of Clifford or want to kill him lol

This is the absolute funniest movie Martin Short has ever made (to date)! Hilarious from beginning to end! (BTW, Martin Short plays the funniest priest in the history of film besides the funniest child character ever!) Charles Grodin is perfect as Clifford's poor frustrated uncle! Dabney Coleman as Charles Groden's boss is ever-so creepy and plays the part to the hilt! And this is our fave movie with Mary Steenbergen - she is sweet, as always, but allowed to be funny, too. The writing, directing, editing, clever photography (to make Clifford/Martin Short look small) is 100% pure genius! We've watched this movie over and over and over through the years and cannot rate it high enough! The dialog is more-than hilarious and we quote lines from this film all the time. If you have a sense of humor and like to laugh, this movie is a MUST SEE! 100% GENIUS!! Martin Short is a comic genius!!!

The only reason I watched this whole thing through was it just had to get better at some point. It HAD to! There was just too much talent on the screen for this mess to keep stumbling along at low speed. Martin Short stars as the title character who is apparently a ten year old boy. At least he is supposed to be. Anyway, he is truly a monster. He plays a series of cruel practical jokes on his uncle played by Charles Grodin. Grodin has agreed to watch the little brat for whatever reason I don't quite recall. He hopes that taking care of the little tyke will impress Mary Steenburgen whom he is intending to marry. Grodin is basically one of those long-term bachelors (like yours truly) who waited until practically middle age to settle down. Hopefully bonding with the young man will show his lady that he is in fact a good catch.The first time you look at Martin Short, and accept the premise that he is in fact a little boy, you begin to expect to laugh. But the filmmakers must have thought the premise was enough, since they just don't give Clifford and his uncle enough funny things to do. Most of the pranks are cruel, and a few are admittedly funny. The only real laughs I had were watching Grodin's reactions to some of the pranks. He was a really talented guy, but it looks like he mostly retired after this came out. Hard to blame him. There is a stupid subplot involving Dabney Coleman trying to win Steenburgen over and eventually almost trying to rape her in the back of a limo. Ha ha. The film has a cheap look to it, and its no surprise to learn it was actually filmed in 1990. This was during a bleak period of American cinema when even some of the better films were just lazily made. The climax of this film takes place at a Dinosaur themed amusement park that looks incredibly cheap and mostly made with cardboard and matte paintings. The musical score is a generic up-beat, by-the-numbers deal that sounds like something Danny Elfman would have wadded up and thrown in the garbage in a fit of despair.The stars of this film deserved something better, and I have no doubt that better writers and a better director could have had something here. But as it stands, Clifford is an unfunny, mean-spirited mess. And a big waste of talent. 3 of 10 stars.The Hound.

I worked on the advertising for this film so I saw it many times. The fact that many people seem to find it funny is chilling. It is lame, witless distasteful, poorly staged and acted and generally nasty looking. The strange writhings of Martin Short are deeply embarrassing and at no point can he possibly be mistaken for a 10 year old boy.If this was an on purpose plot point it is never developed or exploited. Instead you are expected to believe in this grown up (though odd) man as a juvenile, for no other reason than the film makers pretense that that is what he is.About as funny as a collapsed lung. Why it was ever made is yet another Hollywood mystery.