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Welcome to Mooseport (2004)
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Reviews Counted:143
Fresh:19
Rotten:124
Average Rating:4.2/10
Consensus: A bland comedy that squanders a talented cast.
Rated: PG-13 [See Full Rating] for some brief sexual comments and nudity
Runtime: 1 hr 55 mins
Genre: Comedies
Theatrical Release:Feb 20, 2004 Wide
Box Office: $14,244,145
Synopsis: The quiet, charming town of Mooseport, Maine is invaded by the former president of the country in this Capraesque comedy starring Ray Romano and Gene Hackman. Monroe "The Eagle" Cole (Gene Hackman)... The quiet, charming town of Mooseport, Maine is invaded by the former president of the country in this Capraesque comedy starring Ray Romano and Gene Hackman. Monroe "The Eagle" Cole (Gene Hackman) is a hugely popular Clinton-era former president, who retires to bucolic Mooseport, Maine after a bitter divorce from his wife (Christine Baranski). Coincidentally, Mooseport is in need of a new mayor and Cole steps in to what he thinks will be a one-man race and a much-needed publicity boost. However, local handyman and plumber Handy Harrison (Ray Romano) has entered the race as well, complicating the no-contest election. Handy is a beloved Mooseport local, well-liked but incapable of committing to his long-time girlfriend Sally Mannis (Maura Tierney). Sally has spent the last seven years waiting for Handy to propose and so, when a smitten Cole asks her out on a dinner date, she eagerly accepts in hopes of making Handy jealous. It works, turning the race into a personal and political rivalry as Handy fights not only the mayorship but also to regain Sally's heart. Supporting stars include Marcia Gay Harden and Rip Torn as members of Cole's staff, who help to launch a full-scale campaign in the town of less than a thousand people. [More]
Starring: Gene Hackman, Ray Romano, Maura Tierney, Christine Baranski
Starring: Gene Hackman, Ray Romano, Maura Tierney, Christine Baranski, Marcia Gay Harden, Fred Savage, Rip Torn
Director: Donald Petrie
Director: Donald Petrie
Screenwriter: Tom Schulman
Story: Doug Richardson
Producer: Tom Schulman, Basil Iwanyk, Mark Frydman
Composer: John Debny
Studio: 20th Century Fox
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Reviews for Welcome to Mooseport
The film’s ridiculously contrived main conflict plays out with all the drama and interest of the Utah primary.
If you're looking for inoffensive material that will occasionally draw a chuckle, Welcome to Mooseport is for you.
Clunkily earthbound as its characters and the situations plod forward while never getting anywhere.
This lackluster production fails to generate much in the way of tension and less in the way of merriment.
Mooseport is one of those dreaded middle-of-the-road comedies. It's a friendly, nicety-nice, mock-funny, play-it-safe and use-all-the-cliche's-we-got style deal. Yech.
A disappointingly limp small-town farce played several shades too broadly by a cast that has done better work elsewhere.
Despite solid backup from the ever-formidable Gene Hackman and others, this routine hiatus schedule-filler proves to be a shaky platform from which to launch the likable Romano's candidacy as a big-screen leading man.
"Could have used three or four more passes through the funny machine."
The outcome of the election is never in doubt in this fluff, and neither is the dramatic face-off.
[Hackman and Romano] work well together here, and Tierney does a heroic job of playing a character who doesn't know how the story will end, when everybody else, in the cast and in the audience, has an excellent idea.
Welcome to Mooseport isn't a belly-laugh farce. It's more along the lines of a My Cousin Vinny, where you just enjoy almost everybody who crosses the screen.
Just isn’t mean spirited enough to give us genuine small town comedy.
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