Osmosis Jones
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| Osmosis Jones | |
|---|---|
 Movie poster for "Osmosis Jones" |
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| Directed by | Bobby Farrelly Peter Farrelly |
| Produced by | Dennis Edwards Bobby Farrelly Peter Farrelly Zak Penn Bradley Thomas |
| Written by | Marc Hyman |
| Starring | Bill Murray Laurence Fishburne Chris Rock |
| Music by | Randy Edelman |
| Distributed by | Warner Bros. Pictures |
| Release date(s) | August 7, 2001 |
| Running time | 95 min. |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $75 million |
| IMDb profile | |
Osmosis Jones (2001) is a part animated, part live action film whose title character is Osmosis Jones, an anthropomorphic white blood cell. Unusually for this genre, the live action characters and cartoon characters never meet. The live action characters are people as they appear in the real world, and the animated characters are the cells and germs which live inside a man named Frank, whom the story concerns. A TV spinoff has been created named Ozzy & Drix, which concerns the two characters of the same name.
Contents |
[edit] Plot
Frank is a slovenly zookeeper. Much to the frustration of his young daughter Shane, he eats and drinks compulsively and has no regard for germs or diseases. Early on, as a follower of the "five second rule", to Shane's disgust, he consumes a hard-boiled egg that was covered in filth from the grass within the chimpanzees' enclosure. He had earlier been fighting for possession of the egg against one of the apes.
Inside Frank's body, another story unfolds. Osmosis Jones works as a member of Immunity, Frank's immune system, as a white blood cell. He is a rebel cop, rarely doing what his chief tells him to. Meanwhile, Mayor Phlegmming is preparing for re-election, campaigning with the promise of more junk food (much to the joy of the citizens in the Love Handle District). The Mayor's reckless policies are largely responsible for Frank's deteriorating health. However, his re-election hopes are complicated by the arrival of Thrax, a deadly virus that came in with the egg.
In an attempt to cover up the severity of the situation, Phlegmming tells Frank to take a cold pill. The pill, Drix (short for Drixonal), arrives in the body and Osmosis Jones becomes his partner. Soon, they unravel Thrax's plot to masquerade as the common cold while at the same time plotting to overheat Frank's body, killing him from the inside out. Thrax is motivated by trying to become the nastiest new virus, attempting to kill each new victim faster than the previous. His grandiose plan for Frank is death in 48 hours, breaking previous medical records.
Eventually, Osmosis and Drix confront Thrax in one of Frank's zits. Drix launches a grenade of medication at Thrax and his cronies, popping the skin blemish, and seemingly ending Thrax's siege. To hide the truth, Phlegmming forces Drix to leave and fires Osmosis, who insists that Thrax was more than the common cold. Osmosis' prediction rings true as Thrax was able to survive the explosion and decides to launch a one-man assault on Frank's hypothalamus.
Eventually, Ozzy and Thrax fight directly. In the process, they are thrown onto one of Shane's false eyelashes, which she was wearing atop her natural ones. Ozzy is able to escape; Thrax falls into a vessel of alcohol below. Frank is revived. Phlemming loses position as mayor and is finally ejected from the body via its rectum.
Interlaced with the main plot are several live action sequences that detail Frank's troublesome relationship with Shane outside the body. Her mother died at an early age, and we might speculate Frank has deteriorated as a result of depression caused by attachment. Frank humiliated Shane's teacher, Mrs. Boyd, during a science fair, thanks to a mistake on Ozzy's part when he, inside Frank's body, saw a germ in the stomach and pushed the "puke" button. Mrs. Boyd is humiliated again later on in the film, when the popped blemish landed on her lip. Shane is ashamed of her father. Seeing him facing a terminal virus creates an epiphany in both of them. Frank needs to start caring for his body, and Shane learns to stop blaming Frank's apathy for her mother's death.
[edit] Film production
Osmosis Jones went through a troubled time in production. The animated sequences, directed by Tom Sito and Piet Kroon, went into production as planned, but acquiring both a director and a star actor for the live-action sequences took some time, until Bill Murray was cast as the main character of Frank, and Peter and Bobby Farrelly stepped in to direct the live action sequences. As part of their contract, the Farrelly Brothers are credited as the primary directors of the film, although they did no supervision of the animated portions of the film.
Upon its original release, the film lost a considerable amount of money, and was the second-to-last production for Warner Bros.' feature traditional animation department (following The Iron Giant, and followed by Looney Tunes: Back in Action, which both also lost money upon their original releases).
[edit] Taglines
- Every Body Needs A Hero.
- It's the comedy that gets under your skin.
- He's one cell of a guy, and his partner's a real pill. (referring to Osmosis and Drix, respectively)
- She's got a jones for Osmosis. Leah. One hot hormone. (Leah)
[edit] Trivia
- A running joke in the movie is that Leah is called Brandy, who provided the voice for the character, various times throughout the movie. In addition, on her desk in the brain her nameplate says Brandy in at least one shot.
- Despite his name, which implies that he is an being of anthrax, Thrax is heavily suggested to be Scarlet Fever (he is called the "Red Death" by those who fear him), a disease which hasn't been a serious threat for many decades if not centuries.
- A draft of the script reveals that when Osmosis went to a family reunion when he was young. At that time Frank went to the doctors to have some blood taken out. The needle drew out all of Ozzy's relatives, leaving him all alone. The alternate ending has Frank getting a blood tranfusion to save his life, with his own blood prior. It would have his family and relatives returning to Frank in a parody of the returnes in Close Encounters of the Third Kind.
- The film was originally rated PG-13, but was edited so it could be re-rated PG.
- The pill name Drixenol is spelled as Drixinol on the Closed Captioning.
- This film reunites Bill Murray with Chris Elliot who plays his brother Bob. Both actors worked together in Murray's 1993 blockbuster Groundhog Day
- The film Titanic was spoofed during the scene where Frank is close to dying, there is a scene that looks like the part of the ship sinking. In a group of music playing cells, one of them says "Gentlemen, it has been a privilege playing with you tonight." They play Nearer, My God, to Thee, reportedly the last song played by Titanic's musicians.
- The film, Terminator 2: Judgment Day was spoofed in the final battle between Ozzy and Thrax:
1) Thrax sticks his claw into both Ozzy's body and Shane's fake eyelash. Ozzy finally gets himself free by splitting up partially in a "semi-mitosis" (since he is a cell), and finally reformed by re-joining his partially-split body. This is similar to the T-1000's self-splitting ability.
2) Thrax tries to pull himself free, but is stuck, and eventually, the whole set of false eyelashes falls into a beaker of alcohol, which dissolves him. He screams in pain and horror as he melts away. This is similar to the T-1000's screaming as he melts to death in a vat of molten steel.
[edit] Cast and crew
[edit] Directors
- Tom Sito and Piet Kroon
- Peter Farrelly and Bobby Farrelly (live action)
[edit] Voice cast
- Chris Rock - Osmosis Jones
- Laurence Fishburne - Thrax
- David Hyde Pierce - Drix
- Brandy Norwood - Leah
- William Shatner - Mayor Phlegmming
- Ron Howard - Tom Colonic
In addition, Ben Stein, Joel Silver, John Melendez and Kid Rock's band (including himself, Joe C., and Uncle Kracker) have cameo voice roles.
[edit] Live action cast
- Bill Murray - Frank
- Elena Franklin - Shane
- Chris Elliott - Bob
- Molly Shannon - Mrs. Boyd
