Film review: Years in the making, Coyote vs. Acme sings a sad toon

From left, Lana Condor, Wile E. Coyote and Will Forte in Coyote vs. Acme. Photo by Warner Bros.

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I waited years, decades, for this movie. The Road Runner cartoons were part of my Gen X childhood, blasting shameless violence from the boob tube every Saturday morning. “Coyote v. Acme,” a New Yorker comic piece written in legalese, was published in 1990 when I was an impressionable young journalism student. The film began development in 2018.

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It lands in theatres this week. And I’m sorry to say but it landed on me like a boulder, squishing my body into a wheezy accordion. I waited a lifetime for this? What a maroon!

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It’s earnest, hopeful, and ambitious. But it’s a misfire on par with Acme’s rocket-powered roller skates.

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Let’s start with its human star, Will Forte. Funny guy; SNL, MacGruber, Last Man on Earth. But he’s not Looney, which is what this movie needs. John Cena, who has a part as an Acme lawyer and engages in a hilarious diphthong-off with Tweety Bird, is Looney. So was Bob Hoskins, star of Who Framed Roger Rabbit?

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What is Looney? It’s difficult to define but you know it when you see it. Will Ferrell, Steve Martin, Jason Segel — all Looney. Forte’s a little too grounded, too morose. Ditto Lana Condor, who plays his character’s niece and the intern at his law firm, which Wile E. Coyote hires to sue the Acme corporation over its comically destructive product line.

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John Cena and Tweety Bird in Coyote vs. Acme. Photo by Warner Bros.

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In fact, Condor’s role is indicative of another problem with the film; too many humans, not enough toons. Sure, we get cameos aplenty, and Foghorn Leghorn in a meaty role as an Acme executive.

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But the mighty Bugs Bunny is relegated to a shadowy Deep Throat character, a role that could have been played by anyone. Casting him as Forte’s right hand would have killed two birds (apologies to Tweety and Foghorn) with one stone.

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There’s also the matter of time period. Coyote cartoons are mid-century creations. Roger Rabbit was set in 1947. Putting Coyote vs. Acme squarely in the present day creates a tension greater than one Acme Brand Giant Rubber Band (For Tripping Road Runners). And images of the classic-looking Coyote interacting with a clearly CG-animated modern fighter jet cause the tension to snap.

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Director Dave Green and writer Samy Burch (who has another film in theatres, the excellent Late Fame with Willem Dafoe) should have focused more on cartoon antics and inanity, and less on courtroom capers. As funny as it is to watch Luis Guzman as a judge banging a squeaky gavel, it can’t hold a candle to the sort of physics-defying comedy of a classic Road Runner cartoon.

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The first of those, Fast and Furry-ous, was released in theatres almost 80 years ago, on Sept. 17, 1949. Audiences might have seen it ahead of a screening of White Heat, a Warner Bros. crime thriller starring James Cagney.

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Amazingly, it arrived with most of its signature elements already baked in. The characters were introduced with faux-Latin names and communicated with signs. (The Road Runner had one that said: “Road Runners Can’t Read.”)