Imagine That: Choose Your Adventure

The biggest problem with Eddie Murphy’s latest offering, Imagine That, is that it’s neither terrible enough to ruthlessly tear apart nor good enough to remember or praise. Concerning a financial executive father virtually unable to pay any attention to his daughter until miraculously, he discovers that his daughter’s comfort toy, a blanket named Googie (or something similarly named) could benefit his job. Murphy’s daughter uses her blanket to correspond with magical princesses and a queen that happen to give lucrative, expert advice on finance, creating a convenient catalyst for Murphy to finally bond with his daughter. What ensues is a by-the-books family film about distant parents overcoming their selfish needs in order to properly love and care for the children they’ve carelessly spawned. However, if you take a step back and realize that it took a magical blanket with promotion potential power to hook Murphy’s character, what do the thousands of other little girls in the world have to woo their busy daddies into noticing them? Murphy is his standard, comical self, and Imagine That has some amusing and touching moments interspersed throughout its blandness, not to mention a very endearing little girl (Yara Shahidi) that adds more depth to the film than Murphy. Additionally, Thomas Hayden Church provides the most brilliantly uncomfortable moments in the film as Johnny Whitefeather, Murphy’s competition for a groovy promotion. Church is sleazy and awful as a faux Native American using a pretend heritage as a convenient schtick, and he had me squirming around anxiously whenever he was on screen. And it’s a treat to see Nicole Ari Parker, perhaps forever to be associated with her debut in the mid 90’s with The Incredibly True Adventure of Two Girls In Love (1995), which was cutting edge queer cinema at the time, and still a higher quality than much of the queer specific indie output of recent years---and she’ll always be a darling in my book due to her appearance in A Map of the World (1999). Martin Sheen also shows up for an entertaining cameo appearance. Sadly, all of these aspects considered, Imagine That is a convenient, but wholly unbelievable vehicle for Murphy---let’s hope he’s a good dad to the seed he spawned with the Spice girl (among various others). Dreamgirls aside, Murphy’s latest may be forgettable, but it’s the best picture he’s been a part of in the 2000’s. That’s a damn shame.