What is it with Hollywood, anyway? For decades now, these studios have done nothing but take perfectly good pieces of gold and turn them to shit; after which, they spend millions trying to get the shit to look like plastic. But it’s not plastic. It’s a formerly golden turd with my name on it.
I made Hancock back in 1994. Instead of releasing it like sane people, the big Hollywood studio I worked for shelved the picture because at the time no one watched Superhero films and The Fresh Prince was just another white dude with a tv show.
But now, a decade-and-a-half later, both The Fresh Prince and Superhero movies are some hot shit. So those nutholes take my Hancock out of the vaults and attempt to re-edit it right out of the mid-nineties. But instead of hiring ME to do this job, they get Mike Myers and that fat guy from The Sopranos because they both think they might want to direct someday. (And for all those conspiracy buffs out there, no I don’t think Mike Myers’ death was a suicide. For all you Shrek fans out there, yes Mike Myers is dead.)
I’d be more upset, but it was never really my movie anyway. The studios wouldn’t even let me name the goddamn thing. You know it as Hancock, but when we shot it the title was Tonight, He Comes, and even THAT was a compromised version of the original title, Boston Buttfuck Creampie.
They released it last year as a huge summer movie, and it performed really well despite the 15 year old computer effects and three wildly divergent editorial hands. I guess that’s star power for you. The Fresh Prince is one charming guy. His DJ is very nice, too.
So what’s the movie about? Well, that’s hard to say. You kind of have to view each 30 minute segment as its own, individual film. It’s like an anthology but with the same characters and story.
Third #1:
This is my particular favorite third. Hancock is a drunk superhero that no one likes because when he saves one day he usually fucks up ten others. Like, instead of just stopping a bank robbery, Hancock will grab the bank’s entire city block and throw it into the sun, destroying not only the robbers, but the robbed and the money which connected them. The police can’t do anything about him because he’s too strong to kill. The city around him must simply find a way to live within Hancock’s personal Warzone.
We find that this situation sucks for Hancock as well. See, people can’t harm him, so they show their frustration by calling him an “asshole”. Amazingly enough, getting called an “asshole” hurts Hancock, kind of like how the word “chicken” hurts Marty McFly, or how Kryptonite hurts Batman. He needs to find a way to make these assholes happy so they’ll stop calling him an “asshole” all day, giving him a headache and ey’thang.
To this end, he hires Michael Cera’s dad whose professional expertise as an advertiser amounts to stenciling hearts onto the Eiffel Tower, Mount Rushmore, and all kinds of other places usually blown up in disaster/alien invasion films. He thinks he can save the world by covering it in corporate-sponsored good vibes. Hancock’s impressed by this idea not because he’s an asshole, but because he’s a dumb asshole.
He has Hancock over for dinner. Hancock’s awful social skills make him a hit with young Michael Cera, but the mom of the house is not so impressed. She keeps shooting him mean looks that say, “Get out of my house!” Every so often though, her look briefly cracks and says, “I want to take your (half the film’s title) and put it in my (other half of the film’s title + D).” This will become unbelievably important later. Seriously, you will not believe it. You will say, “What the fuck?” And I will say, “It made sense when the movie was three hours long and filled with humping.”
Third #2:
This third is somewhat different than the one which came before. Mostly because the first third was funny. This third wants to be funny but doesn’t know how, kind of like Steve Martin’s evil twin, Old Steve Martin.
Michael Cera’s dad tells Hancock to win people’s trust by voluntarily carrying out a prison sentence. Hancock agrees, but he knows it will be annoying since criminals have a bad habit of forgetting he’s a superhero. Sure enough, on the first day all these locked-up criminals surround Hancock and threaten him with physical harm unaware that they are like babies trying to push around Santa Claus the Immortal. This always happens to poor Hancock, and he always has to resolve it by sticking one guys head up another guy’s ass.
In addition to the head/ass stick-upping, Hancock must also undergo alcoholics anonymous. This series of scenes comes to a climax when Hancock finally admits to having a drinking problem. He’s instantly cured of alcoholism after this. According to the movie, the first and last step is admitting you like to drink. Bottoms up!
Hancock also bides his time by drawing eagles all over his prison cell. These eagles match the eagle on his hat, which matches the eagle someone carved into his back, who looks quite a bit like the eagle sidekick he has at the end of the movie. Eagles are fucking awesome. Eagles!!!
Third #3:
Here’s where things take a dramatic turn for the comically serious. The city finally comes crawling to Hancock, asking him to let himself out of jail so he can solve some crime. They have bank robbery situation which only Superheroics can solve. Hancock deals with the robbers by flying to Canada, borrowing one of Neil Pert’s crash symbles, throwing it like a discus, and cutting off every villainous arm in the bank. Elated by his first success, Hancock goes to celebrate with his only friends, Michael Cera and his parents.
When he gets there, Momma Cera makes love eyes at him. When he tries to kiss her, she suddenly goes apeshit and throws him across the America. Holy Shit! She got powers too! Aw Hell Naw!!!
It turns out that Hancock and Momma Cera are Gods, or maybe just Angles, or Demons, or possibly just Eagles dressed as people. I’m not too sure in this cut of the movie. Anyway, they were made in pairs. If they get close to each other, they become mortal pussies. But they’re cosmically paired, so fate keeps putting them together. The last time, 80 years ago, Hancock lost his memory so she just dumped him at the YMCA and hoped for the best.
Words are powerful in this film. “Asshole” can hurt Hancock. Saying he’s an alcoholic cures his alcoholism. As they fight, Hancock finds that Momma Cera’s Kryptonite word is “Crazy”. The whole “together we become mortal” thing only becomes true once she says it out loud. And brooding in jail, some bland arm-less would-be bank robber gets the power to kill Hancock simply by saying, “Ima gonna bust me outta hear and kill that Handcock four shure.”
Twenty minutes later both Hancock and Momma Cera are in the hospital with broken shins caused by general Immortal=>Mortal downgrade clumsiness. In walks this arm-less douche bag. Immediately he starts beating up Hancock with his feet. Oddly, blows received by Hancock also hurt Momma Cera. They apparently have some kind of Elliot/ET symbiotic thing going on which was not covered by the dialog.
Anyway, even with normal strength, Hancock manages to shove this guy’s head up his own asshole. Then, choosing to save both himself and his girlfriend’s self, he flies to the moon and draws a heart on it in honor of Michael Cera’s dad, who died of cuckoldry on a cosmic level.
I guess there are worse ways to spend 90 minutes at the movies. At this point I wouldn’t want to release my three hour intended cut because the effects are so dated. But I guess that didn’t stop them with this version, did it? Maybe someday you will find a delux double VHS version of Hancock at your local Suncoast. Start the petition NOW.